NFOG Chronicles
by Soldier Boy
Summary: N-FOG. The NERV Field Operations Group. A group of thirteen soldiers gathered by the United Nations from different countries and units, put together for the purpose of operations supporting NERV.
1. The Team Is Gathered

1547 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Fort Benning, Georgia

Camouflaged men are sitting and kneeling everywhere on the concrete pad, disassembling and cleaning weapons.

"Lampright! Front and center!"

One of the men, helping a gunner clean his M-249, stood up, slung his rifle, and walked over to the officer and saluted.

"Colonel, Captain Lampright reporting, sir."

"At ease Lampright."

"What's this about, sir?"

"Grab your gear. You're bein' transferred."

"Transferred? What's this about?"

"They asked for the best of our best. So I chose you."

"Thank you sir. So what did you volunteer me for?"

"You're bein' grabbed by the U.N. They want you to lead an operations group in support of one of their pet projects."

"U.N.? Great. Frickin' great. Where is it?"

"That's the best part. Pack your bags, you're goin' to Japan."

2134 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Aboard a C-130 to Tokyo-3, Japan

Lampright glanced around the cargo bay for the hundredth time at the other four occupants of the large aircraft, each one wearing a uniform from a different branch.

"So, you guys here for the whole 'top secret U.N.' thing too?" Lampright said, breaking the relative silence of the cargo area.

"Yep." replied a guy in a marine enlisted uniform.

Lampright unstrapped himself and walked over to the walked over to the other four and shook each of their hands in turn.

"Captain Eric Lampright, Army Rangers. I'm supposed to run this unit, whatever the hell it is."

"Staff Sergeant Henry Carey, Air Force Special Operations. I'm a team leader."

"Staff Sergeant Rick Jackson, Army Special Forces Operational Detachment Delta. I can put a 40 mil through a firing slit at a hundred meters."

Gunnery Sergeant Ben Maloy, Marine Force Recon, AR."

"Chief Petty Officer Daniel Cooper, Navy SEALs. I'm a demo specialist."

"Good to meet you all, since we'll probably be working together. Cooper, long time no see."

1443 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

Outside Gendo Ikari's Office, NERV Headquarters

Lampright dressed in his Class B knocks on the door of the facility commander, Gendo Ikari.

"Come in."

Lampright opens the door and steps in and snaps to attention.

"Captain Lampright reporting sir."

"Take a seat, captain."

"Thank you, sir." Lampright replied and sat down.

"What do you need, soldier?"

"Well sir, I've read my brief, and it really doesn't clarify what my team and I are supposed to do."

"You and your 'team' are supposed to do as you're told."

'Clarifies a lot, jack-ass.' Lampright thought.

"What is our purpose, then, sir?"

"Your 'purpose' is the execution and support of small scale military actions near and within their facility, and operations pertaining to the continued operation and well-being of NERV and it's personnel."

'Better. At least now I know my job.' He thought.

"Alright, sir. Who is my immediate superior?"

"That would be Captain Katsuragi, the operations head. She won't be arriving for several days, maybe even a week."

"Alright sir. I have some requests that will seem kind of unorthodox, but-"

"Whatever you need, you have my authorization. Whatever allowances you've had arranged will, however, be subject to review by Captain Katsuragi."

"Understood. I'll be getting my team situated until then."

"Dismissed."

Lampright stood up and saw himself out of the office. He returned to his quarters and changed into his BDUs and heads to their designated office space that had so far only really been used as a rally point. He did a quick count of the men, and, seeing they were all there, started his brief.

"Let's get a few things straight here. I am Captain Lampright, and I'm in charge of this outfit. Upon issue of weapons, you will carry your sidearm everywhere, including to PT. Each day will start at 0500. At that time, your will meet me, in PT gear, at the door of this office. On Sundays, you will report here for PT at 0800, upon completion, you will be dismissed for two hours for religious practices, after which you will report back here, understood?"

The troops all mutter something to the effect of affirmative.

"I really don't have to tell you this, but I will anyway, just for purposes of CYA. Let's try to behave, alright? We are frickin' guests."

"So let's get introductions out of the way. The time will come soon when all of us will depend on each other, so let's get to know each other. Name, position and where you came from."

"And favorite color!" Someone yells from the back.

"I'm Element Commander Eric Lampright, from the U.S. Army Rangers."

"I am Assistant Element Commander Boris Denisovich, from Russian Airborne Spetsnaz."

"John Howard, British SAS, I lug the rad-telo."

"I am Fritz Jaeger, German Airborne, I am a long-range marksman."

"Sniper!" Someone yells from the back, receiving a dark look from Jaeger.

"Pat Smith, medic from the French Foreign Legion."

"Henry Carey, 1st Team Leader, formerly of the U.S. Air Force Special Operations Group."

"Daniel Cooper, rifleman and demo expert from the U.S. Navy SEALs."

"Jeff Montgomery, British SAS grenadier."

"Machine gunner Dick Larson, Canadian JTF-2."

"Toji Sonoda, of the Japanese Self-Defense Force. I am the 2nd Team Leader."

"Michael Herford, Australian SASR, I'm an anti-tank gunner."

"Rick Jackson, U.S. Army, Special Forces Operational Detachment Delta. I'm a grenadier."

"Automatic rifleman Ben Maloy, U.S. Marine Force Recon."

"Great now that we know each other, we can all be friends, right? Alright boys, and now for the moment you've all been waiting for, our tour of the armoury."

This idea is met with approval by all of the troops. The troops head to the armoury, walking down the new halls of the NERV building, the only troops in any kind of field uniform, and eventually reach the armoury where they pick through the weapons supply.

"Is everybody's favorite pick here?"

Everyone remarks to the affirmative.

"Alright. Everybody draw their weapons, two hundred rounds for your main, and four mags for your sidearm. Whenever weapons are issued, you'll return everything but your sidearm and it's ammo. Those are for you to keep in case somethin' goes down and you can't make it to the armoury."

Everyone finishes drawing, and Lampright signs for everything.

"Alright. Now, move to the range. We'll clean, customize and zero there."

The troops spend the rest of the afternoon, and part of the evening cleaning, installing SOPMODs, and zeroing their weapons. As they finish, they return their weapons and trickle back to their quarters.

2323 hrs.Undisclosed Date +6

Residential Area, NERV Headquarters

'I wonder who's gettin' the empty room next door.' Lampright wondered for the fifth time as he returned home to his quarters. He had just finished spending about three hours looking over the HQ's floor plans. Just as he opened the door, radio blared to life.

"Lampright assemble your team and report to the briefing room immediately."

"Roger that."

Lampright walked down the row, pounding on each door.

"Let's go, let's go, let's go! Command's got a job for us! Meet in the briefing room in full combat attire!"

While the men were dressing, Lampright grabbed all his combat gear and reported to the briefing room where Mr. Ikari was waiting.

"What's the news, sir?" Lampright said once his team was assembled.

"The 'news' captain, is that a van full of NERV personnel on it's way here from the airport was hi-jacked and the personnel held hostage. We have a location on the personnel because of the tracker installed on all NERV vehicles. I do not need to tell you NERV position on negotiating with terrorists."

"So we're supposed to do a hostage rescue?"

"Yes, but I want an example made of these men."

"You want all of them dead, da?" Denisovich put in.

"Yes."

"Alright. I'm gonna need all the info you have on the hide-out and the terrorists, pictures of all the NERV personnel, two helicopters for deployment that can be on stand-by in the area, a terrain map with a scale of one inch to ten yards centered on the camp, and a live recon feed of the area."

"Understood."

"I want it all in the briefing room, ASAP. Everybody go grab your weapons and report back here at 0015. Jaeger, and Denisovich, you guys draw your gear and report back here. You guys are gonna be helping me with the planning. Denisovich, draw my gear while you're at it. Sonoda, you'll supervise the weapon draws, make sure to draw at least four flash-bangs a person and detail your guys to carry demo gear. Carey, draw the rope, thirteen quick-rope harnesses, and two dozen each of sand-bags and riot-cuffs. Everybody understand?"

Everyone signaled that they understood, and everyone went to tackle their assigned objective.

As information began to flood into the briefing room, Lampright and Denisovich began to formulate a plan.

"I know it's a long shot, but we don't have anything else." Lampright said.

"Da, it COULD work but-"

"But nothin'. With the amount of time we've got, it's the best chance we have. Besides, I've done a similar op before, it'll be a bitch to pull-off, but I think we can do it. The big problem will be their force deployment and numbers. We don't have any real data on that. Just speculation and estimates."

"Da, and that's why the sniper's here?"

"Yeah, he's got a good eye. Even so, if they have more guards stationed nearby, like in the woods or something, our count'll be bad. So I'm not putting much faith in it."

"Also, we will be entering the building from the ground? Is the best way to clear a building not from the top-"

"Yeah, but that would mean dropping from helo, and they'd hear that while we were at least a halfa klick out. It's the best way. Besides, we're supposed to kill'em all, right?"

"Da."

0015 hrs.Undisclosed Date +7

Briefing Room, NERV Headquarters

Lampright's standing in front of the other twelve troops with the map in front of him. "Alright, so here's the plan. We'll deploy by helo. Howard, Smith and I will be with Carey's squad, while Jaeger and Denisovich deploy with Sonoda's squad. Sonoda's unit will deploy here, north of the target and set up a base of fire. Carey's unit will drop here, move up from the south, and infiltrate the main building here, they're the assault element. As soon as we enter the main building, we'll radio you Sonoda. As soon as you hear that, you and your boys open up on anything that moves. Until then, nobody fires until told to unless you are fired upon first. We need to maintain stealth as long as we can. Remember, if we screw up, they might start wasting hostages. Carey's been a part of HRTs before, so he knows the drill. Everybody in the assault element follow his lead, and remember your MOUT training. Once the hostages are secured, they will be moved the roof where they will be extracted by helo. At that point we will sweep the area, kill everyone and destroy everything. Any questions?"

No one says anything.

"Alright. Memorize the lay out. Make no mistake, this one's gonna be close. But we can do it. Now then..."

Lampright begins the detailed explanation of the mission.

0153 hrs.Undisclosed Date +7

Helipad, NERV Headquarters

Lampright plugged his headset into the intercom.

"You've been briefed on the situation, right?" Lampright said over the intercom to the pilot.

"Yes sir."

"And you have no problem with extracting from a hot LZ?"

"Always up for a challenge sir."

"Outstanding. Let's go!"

The choppers take off, navigational lights deactivated, and begin the flight to the insertion point.

0309 hrs.Undisclosed Date +7

Somewhere near Tokyo-3

The chopper hovers about ten meters above the ground, and the ropes go out. The seven men of Carey's element fast-rope down to the ground, emptying the helo in under five seconds. Mean while, three klicks to the north, a similar scene was playing out. The element spread out and moved toward the objective silently in the darkness of the early morning. They're moving silently when Carey suddenly stops and signals to go prone. Lampright moves up quietly to Carey's position. Carey signaled that there were two sentries ahead, facing towards the compound. Lampright pulled his knife and motioned for Carey to follow him, mouthing 'on my command'. The two men quietly crept towards the two sentries. They each took a sentry, Lampright on the left with a bayonet, Carey on the right with a garrote. They each came behind their target, and positioned their weapons.

Satisfied Carey was ready, Lampright whispered "Now."

Lampright clamped his left hand to the sentry's mouth, pulling him against his chest, thrusting his bayonet in one side of his throat and out the other, and pivoting it, slicing open the man's neck flinging blood everywhere. On the other side, Carey was having trouble. His target had somehow managed to get a hand inside of the garrote. The garrote was pushing the hand into his neck hard enough to keep him from crying out, but was making it take forever to kill him. Lampright pulled out his silenced pistol and turned on the laser and shot the man twice in the chest. The man stopped struggling and Carey let go, at which point Lampright fired again, this time into the sentry's head, causing it to explode like bad fruit. Carey stared at Lampright, who holstered his pistol, grinned and flashed Carey a thumbs-up.

Carey signaled for the troops to move up, during which time Lampright wiped the blood off of his bayonet with one of the sentry's pants. The Team moved up to edge of the hills, until they were within LOS of the compound. The men waiting in concealment until Sonoda squelched on his radio, signaling that they were in position.

Lampright made a hand gesture and the seven men began to move from cover to cover towards the entry.

"Jaeger, if you see any shooters make moves, take'em down. Sonoda, if we receive fire, open up on source."

The solitary building was not well lit, providing good concealment in the shadows. Carey's team moved up to assault, while Sonoda's stayed at the edge of the hills to provide cover. The assault group was pressed up against the door, when Jaeger came over the radio.

"Jaeger here. There's a hidden trap door about thirty meters to the east of you, probably a secondary storage or barracks."

"Great. You reckon there'll be a lot of 'em outta there once the shooting starts?"

"Probably."

"Great. Herford, Jaeger's gonna point you at a target. As soon as the firefight starts, I want you to put a javelin right on it."

"Roger that." Herford replied.

"Out." Lampright said.

0348 hrs.Undisclosed Date +7

The troops assembled in their entry positions and prepared to storm the building.

Lampright positioned himself right in front of the door, while Carey and Larson readied flash-bangs.

Lampright whispered "Three..." Lampright readied his under-slung shotgun.

"Two..." Carey and Larson pulled the pins.

"One..." Carey and Larson released the spoons on their grenades.

"NOW!" Lampright yelled as he fired a door-buster round into the flimsy door, blowing off it's hinges. Carey and Larson both throw their grenades in, which explode seconds later, almost at the same time as the javelin missile slammed into the trapdoor. The team stormed into the room, clearing the building from the floor up. Gunfire sounded both outside and inside the building, Sonoda's unit shooting anything moving outside the building, and Carey's unit killing anything with a gun inside the building.

Lampright came around a corner and saw a terrorist, who he cut in half with his shotgun. Across the hall, a grenade thrown into a room by Howard exploded, and Larson jumped in the door and hosed it with fire. While Carey, Cooper and Montgomery and Larson cleared the building, Lampright, Howard, and Smith moved to secure the hostages, moving to the most likely spot, the fourth floor, leaving the behind them the mix of bangs, gunshots, and shouts of 'clear'. Lampright and the other two ran up the last flight of stairs, and came to the door leading from the stairway to the first room. Lampright looked back at the two men following him, nodded and Smith ran up next to him. Lampright slowly turned the handle, opened it, and Smith threw in the flash-bang. The grenade exploded in a huge flash and a loud boom, and the three ran into the room. Howard wasted a gunman lying on the ground clutching his ears, Smith shot a dazed looking gunman in the middle of the room, and Lampright shot two near the left wall. As Howard drew a bead on the last terrorist, Lampright ran over to the gunman, tackled him, and pinned his arms behind his back. The hostages were crouched against the back wall, frightened by their ordeal and the sudden violence of the raid.

"Howard! Riot cuffs!"

Howard sprinted across the room, pulling a set of the double zip-ties from one of his pockets.

"Stop fighting!" Lampright yelled, smoothly and quickly pulling his pistol from his holster and smacking the bottom of the grip across the back of his head, stunning him long enough for Howard to cuff him. Howard also pulled an empty sandbag from his ruck and cinched it over the captive's head.

Lampright ran over and covered the entrance to the stairs leading to the roof.

Smith meanwhile was examining the hostages.

"Don't worry, we're from NERV." Lampright said. "Doc, how they look?"

"They look fine, some cuts and bruises, but pretty good."

"Outstanding. Cuff'em and bag'em."

Smith and Howard got the hostages taken care of quickly.

"Howard, radio."

Howard ran over and dropped to one knee as Lampright grabbed the handset.

"Lampright to Crow One. Come in Crow One."

"I authenticate, seven-foxtrot-eight-lima."

"The package is ready. Requires pick-up."

"Roger that."

Lampright hangs-up the handset.

"Smith, watch the prisoner. If he tries anything, kill'im. Howard, help me get the hostages to the roof."

Lampright moves up the stairs cautiously, and opens the door to the roof just enough throw out a flash-bang. As soon as the grenade exploded, Lampright ran out the door, finding an empty roof.

"Clear." He yells back down the stairs.

Howard and Lampright start bringing the hostages to the roof where they wait for the helicopter. The sounds of gunfire and screams hang in the smoke-filled air around the building. Suddenly Howard claps Lampright on the shoulder.

"Sir! It's Crow One! They say they can't see the roof through all the smoke! They can't land for extraction!

"Shit! Gimme your strobe! Tell'em the IR strobes are on the southwest and northeast corners of the building." Lampright yells as he scrambles around the rooftop activating the strobes.

"What's their situation now!"

"They say they're coming in."

"Sonoda! The helo's comin' in! I want suppressive on anything that moves that isn't on this roof!"

"Roger."

The sound of the gunfire below intensifies.

A round suddenly strikes Lampright in the side of the helmet.

"Fuck! Get down!" Lampright yells as he drops to the ground.

The captain puts his hand to his helmet to check for injuries, and gladly finds that the helmet completely stopped the bullet. He looks around and sees Howard pulling hostages to the ground.

"Sonoda, we got shooters aiming at the roof."

Lampright crawls to the roof edge closest to where the shot came from and looks for the shooter. Suddenly he spots movement.

"Patrol! Comin' from the west!"

Lampright begins firing on them. At this point Carey's team comes up the stairs.

"Carey! Get your guys over here! Helo's gonna be here any second and I got at least six shooters in the brush! Gimme a hand!"

"Roger."

Carey and his men throw themselves down at the roof's edge and open up into the tree line.

0351 hrs.Undisclosed Date +7

"Helo's here sir!" Carey yells, stating the obvious.

"Help Howard load'em on the helo! I'll watch the trees!" Lampright yells.

Howard and Carey load the hostages quickly and the first helo leaves.

"Sonoda, is the ground clear?"

"Nothing movin', sir."

"Alright. Cooper, start rigging the building with explosives, then move to the underground facility. Carey, set up a base of fire on the roof top. Sonoda, sweep the woods west of the building. Denisovich, assign the command element personnel different sectors and start a body count. I'm gonna go check on our prisoner."

Lampright walked down the stairs, finding Smith sitting in a chair about three meters from the prisoner, lying on the floor, unable to sit up with his hands behind his back and a bag over his head.

"You think Ikari'll like'im?" Lampright asked, "I mean he's already gift wrapped and everything."

"I don't see why he wouldn't."

0432 hrs.Undisclosed Date +7

"Ready to go. But sir, you might wanna take a look at this." Cooper said, climbing out of what was left of the entrance to the underground bunker.

"Alright, in a sec. Howard! Call in the bird!"

"Roger."

"So Denisovich, what was the final count?"

"The final count was 48."

Lampright whistles. "Damn. That's a lot of bodies. Alright Cooper, what's up?"

"Come 'ere and take a look, man. You might wanna bright light though"

Cooper drops back into the hole.

"Hey Smith, lemme see your hand spotlight."

"Alright." Smith says as he unclips a very large flashlight from his belt and handing it to Lampright, who takes it and jumps into the hole. He begins shining the light around the inside of the hole.

"Damn. This is a nice hole." Lampright says, noticing the drywall on the inside.

"That's not the half of it. Look at this." Cooper says motioning to a side room.

"Holy shit. State-of-the-art comms system. Where the hell'd they get this?"

"It gets better. There's other rooms full of everything you need to launch a terrorist attack. Guns, ammo, demo, even a pair of armoured vans."

"Well, is it all rigged?"

"Oooohhh yeah, with enough to blow this whole place twice."

"Good. Thanks for the heads-up." Lampright said.

"No prob. Let's get outta here so I can start the fireworks."

"Sold."

Lampright and Cooper climb out of the hole and board the helo that had arrived while they were underground.

0603 hrs.Undisclosed Date +7

Helipad, NERV Headquarters

"What's the meaning of this? Why was I summoned here as well as security!" Commander Ikari asked angrily.

Lampright roughly pushes the captive out of the helicopter, who lands hard on the ground.

"I found you a present, sir. One of the terrorists."

"You were ordered to kill them all."

"Yes sir, but I figured you might wanna talk with him first."

"Good job Lampright. I'm sure he has some...interesting things to say."

"Outstanding. Now, I can give you the debrief in you office if you like sir."

"Excellent."

0734 hrs.Undisclosed Date +7

Gendo Ikari's Office, NERV Headquarters

"And so sir, the op went pretty much as we planned. 48 enemy killed, two structures destroyed, and over a million U.S. dollars worth of equipment destroyed."

"Million dollars?" Commander Ikari asked.

"Yes sir. When my man went to demo the subterranean facility, we found that it was filled with state-of-the-art equipment. These guys had a backer with POWER."

"Interesting. The details of this mission are now sealed with a level 8 SECLAR. Anyone who needs the details of it will be told by me. As far as you and your men are concerned, nothing unusual happened."

"Hu-ah, sir."

"Dismissed."

Lampright leaves the office and heads to the office space where the rest of his men are stripping down and cleaning their weapons. Lampright joins them on the concrete floor.

"Well, it looks like we missed today's PT time, but we did good on the mission, and since we've all been up for the last 27 hours, when you're done here, turn in your weapon and ammo, and take the day off."

The troops, enthused by the idea, finished up their cleaning and one by one left, eventually leaving Lampright cleaning his weapon by himself.

0903 hrs.Undisclosed Date +7

F-NOG Offices

Lampright is sitting at his desk, checking over the official action report on his laptop, alternating between drinking a root beer and moving his head to the Rob Zombie playing through the computer's speakers, when a female walks in.

"Who's in charge of this unit!"

"That would be me, Captain Eric Lampright. And you are...?"

"I am Captain Misato Katsuragi, your superior!"

'Crap.' Lampright thought as he jumped to attention and saluted.

"It's a little late for that now, captain."

"Maybe if you wore some uniform, or maybe rank, ma'am, this wouldn't have happened."

"It's past nine o'clock! Where the hell are the rest of your men!"

"Sleeping, I hope."

"You hope!"

"Yes ma'am. I gave them the day off."

"The day off! What the hell do you think this is! Club Med!"

"No ma'am, I think this is a military operation. A military operation that requires it's members to be operating at peak efficiency. Hence the fact that I gave them the day off when they've been awake for the LAST TWENTY-EIGHT HOURS! And now that my report's done, I'll be joining them."

Lampright closes his laptop, and starts to walks out.

"Please close the door when you're done, captain."

"I'm not done with you yet! You also still have 13 weapons and over six hundred rounds of ammunition unaccounted for! Explain yourself!"

She look at the pistol holstered on his belt.

"Is that one of the missing weapons!"

"Ma'am, not of the weapons are 'missing', I know exactly where they are and all 685 rounds of ammunition. But yes, this weapon is one of the ones that has not been returned, as are the forty nine rounds of forty-five caliber ACP I'm carrying with me."

"Why are you openly carrying a weapon in here!"

"I'm sorry. It's my job!"

"No it's security's job!"

"No, MA'AM. Our purpose is to perform small scale military actions near and within the NERV facility, and to launch and support operations pertaining to the continued operation and well-being of NERV and it's personnel. In order to do so, I have decided that it was best for my operatives to armed at all times. I got approval from Commander Ikari."

"Well, Commander Ikari doesn't run your show, does he? Maybe you should have asked me!"

"I would have if you were here, ma'am."

"Well excuse me, captain! I can't be everywhere at-"

"Ma'am, you're a non-com, so I wouldn't expect you to understand."

"Security personnel are the only NERV personnel allowed to openly carry weapons. That's regulations."

"Ma'am we are combat personnel. Part of our duty is to provide back-up and support to your security forces. If we are unarmed, we are unable to-"

"You're soldiers! What do you mean, you're here to support security!"

"This discussion is unproductive. My AAR is in the printer tray, ma'am. If you have any questions, I can be reached by radio. Goodbye."

Lampright said and walked out.

'Bitch.' Lampright thought.

'Hard-ass.' Captain Katsuragi thought as she began to examine his report.


	2. Recovery

1918 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Briefing Room, NERV Headquarters

Two men in camouflaged uniforms are standing around Captain Katsuragi in the briefing room.

"So the pilot just left?" Captain Lampright asked.

"It would appear so, captain." Captain Katsuragi replied.

"Da, and apparently your security just left him walk out." Denisovich replied from beside Lampright.

"Watch it." Lampright replied, secretly agreeing.

Denisovich, the second in command, was a bear of a man with a thick accent on loan from the Russian Airborne Spetsnaz.

"Well, while he may live in the installation, he goes to school outside of it, so he's allowed to come and go as he pleases. The pilot's name is Shinji Ikari. Here's a picture." Katsuragi replied.

"So, this is our mark." Lampright says causing Captain Katsuragi to cringe at the term he used for the pilot. Lampright takes the picture and commits it to memory before passing it to Denisovich.

"So just a simple retrieval? We just find him and bring him back?" Lampright asked.

"Negative. The pilot is considered sensitive material. You are to locate the target, form a perimeter, preferably without his knowledge, and radio for his extraction. He will be retrieved by a recovery team. Your job will be to make sure that nothing gets in or out of your perimeter."

"Gets in? Are you expecting trouble?" Lampright asked

"There are other organizations that might want the pilot, I can't tell you who, but time is of the essence."

"Is that all?"

"Yes." she replied.

"Alright."

"Captain, I know you keep close tabs on these kids. How come you don't know where he is?"

"We usually track them by satellite, but some kind of solar disturbance is scrambling our signal. We can only narrow it down to three or four square miles."

"Not a problem. He'll be leavin' tracks all over that place. He won't be hard to find."

"Remember, he's NOT to know your there."

"Why?"

"Doesn't matter. Just do it, alright."

"Yes ma'am."

Lampright salutes and heads for his quarters.

He passed pilot Ayanami on the way.

'God, she's creepy.' he thought.

Lampright heads to the section of quarters devoted to his team, a strip of thirteen rooms devoted to his unit and himself. He moves quickly down the row, pounding on each door, and yelling.

"Drop the sock and grab your ruck! We got a mission! Meet in the Armoury at 2000!"

He enters his room, and begins prepping for the mission. Lampright puts on his LBV and gear, the radio's speakers blaring the radio checks of his squad mates.

"Lampright, receiving." he adds in.

He slips his balaclava over his radio grabs his PASGT helmet, and throws on a utility ruck.

Cooper's voice comes over loud on the radio, "So then the man said, you don't eat a pig like that all at once." followed by several loud laughs.

"Clear the radio. Channel is for official traffic only." Lampright said as he exited his room.

Lampright turned around and walked to the armoury.

1945 hrs. Undisclosed Date

N-FOG Armoury, NERV Headquarters

Lampright looks around the armoury with pride, noting that his men had all arrived more than fifteen minutes early. The troops begin to draw arms and ammunition.

"Alright guys. We are to locate and hold a perimeter around a pilot. The picture of our mark has already been circulated by Denisovich, so all of you know what he looks like. Here's the fun part. The mark CAN NOT know we're there. Keep that in mind."

The troops mumble among themselves, but nobody says anything out loud. Lampright glanced at the NERV personnel behind the armoury window.

"Give me the 'sheet." Lampright says and grabs the clipboard from the guy.

"Lemme see, one M-4A2 with shotgun attachment, three M-4A2s with M-203 attachments, three M-4A2s, one AUG A2, one FAMAS, one M-240, one M-249, one PKM, twelve AT-4s, one javelin, and one PSG-1. Alright. I'll sign for all that."

Lampright quickly pens his signature on the first line and hands it back to the NERV lieutenant.

"Alright sir, but you forgot to sign for the ammunition."

"I don't sign for ammunition. You'll get back whatever we don't use. Let's move out!"

Lampright and the other dozen troops move to the motor pool where they pile into a waiting five-ton truck and head off. Lampright, sitting shotgun turns to the driver.

"Drop us off about a two klicks before the original drop point."

"Alright." he says and returns to the task of guiding the truck through the almost empty streets of New Tokyo.

2041 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Somewhere near Tokyo-3

"Unload! Go! Go! Go!"

The troops jump out of the truck before it is even completely stopped. As soon as they hit the ground, everyone looks at Lampright, who makes a cutting motion across his mouth with his hand. The troops spread out and begin looking for signs of the third child. Eventually someone finds fresh tracks, and the group follows them. The tracks lead them to a clearing, where a tent has been set up in a clearing with a fire going.

'Idiots. Why not put up a frickin' sign?' Lampright thought as he motioned for Jaeger, the sniper, to figure out if the pilot was one of he two people sitting around the fire. The sniper turned and glared through the scope of his rifle for what seemed like an eternity, before turning to Lampright and flashing a thumb-up, and also motioning that the second kid was armed.

Lampright whispers into his mic, "Jaeger, if the other kid tries anything, waste'im."

Jaeger gives a thumb-up.

Lampright motioned for the troops to form a perimeter and waved the RTO, Howard to him. As soon as he was close enough, Lampright pulled the handset from his webbing and stuck it under his helmet.

"Authentication is zulu-niner-tango-delta. Target sighted four-point-three klicks from designated DZ. Send it retrieval team. Be advised, second party on sight with mark; armed but does not appear hostile."

"Roger that. Lampright out." Lampright said quietly into the handset.

Lampright signals that extraction for target is in fifteen minutes and then hands the handset back to Howard.

2157 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Lampright notices the retrieval team moving towards the perimeter.

"Maloy, Sonoda, retrieval moving towards your position. Hold fire." Lampright whispered into his mic.

"Roger." Maloy replied.

"Understood." Sonoda whispered over the radio.

The team approached and after a few minutes left with the pilot. Lampright squelched twice on his mic, and everyone silently fell back into the woods, returning to the point where they were dropped off. Lampright motions for Howard to come over and uses the radio to call for their truck, which appears several minutes later. The troops again piled into the vehicle, Lampright up front and then six on each side in the bench seats in the back. When they returned, everyone headed back to the armoury for turn-in, except for Lampright and Denisovich, who went to the briefing room for their de-brief. To their surprise, the officer waiting in the room was a major from NERV Security, not from NERV Ops.

"Where's Captain Katsuragi?" Lampright asked.

"She had uh, personal business to attend to, captain." the NERV flunkie replied.

"What the hell kind of excuse is that?" Denisovich asked loudly.

"Calm down, Denisovich." Lampright said, silently agreeing with him as he thought about his fiancé back home.

"Alright here's the debrief. We spread, found tracks, followed'em, located mark and a second party. Second party was determined to be armed, but not hostile. We radioed that information to the retrieval team, and held the perimeter for them to extract him. We then fell back and extracted ourselves. What are your questions?"

"Did the pilot or second party see you?" the Major asked.

"No sir. My boys are the best of the best. Never even knew we were there."

"Excellent. Did you notice any traces of another party looking for the pilot?"

"No sir. We were the only team for miles as far as I know."

"Outstanding. Dismissed."

Lampright and Denisovich exited the room.

"Hey Boris, I'll take your weapons and ammo back to the armoury for you."

"Da, thank you captain."

"No prob. Party's gonna be in the office, right?"

"Da."

"Cool. See you there in about ten or fifteen mikes."

Lampright heads off to the armoury and returns the weapons and ammunition. Changes into some street cloths, heads to the group's office, and walks in. As soon as he enters, someone presses a can of beer into his hand, which he promptly opens.

Cooper comes up to Lampright within seconds of his entry, "So Lampright, I was tellin' this guy," he says, pointing at Smith, "that we'd had harder missions playin' war back home, right?"

"Yeah, but it's never as fun as when you have live ordinance, hu-ah?" Lampright says with a grin.

"I'll drink to that!" Cooper says, holding his beer out, which Lampright knocks with his own.

A toast! To live ordinance!" Cooper yells.

"HERE HERE!" the other twelve reply and knock cans together with whoever's closest to them.

"Wait a minute, you knew the captain before he was a captain?" Smith said to Cooper.

"Oh, hell yeah. I knew 'im before he even graduated high school." Cooper said.

"Yeah, I almost didn't graduate with you guys. It took ALOT of bribery food to get me to pass."

"Yeah, I'll bet it did." Smith said.

"Hey, hey, hey, hey. That was funny Smith. Remind me again, why was it you couldn't join the U.S. Army?"

"Shut-up." Smith replied.

The party carried on for several hours, a couple of which were spent watching the 'helmet-cam' videos from Lampright, Carey and Sonoda's helmets on a TV that some NERV flunkie would no doubt be looking for the next morning. Sometime around 0100, Lampright sent everybody home and cleaned-up the few cans left on the ground. Other than that, there wasn't really a mess to take care of; the men are professionals, after-all. After all was said and done, he headed back to his quarters to sleep for a few hours until it was time to wake-up and prep for the morning PT at 0500.


	3. The Fifth Angel

1413 hrs.Undisclosed Date

N-FOG Office, NERV Headquarters

The troops of N-FOG are sitting in the office while Lampright instructs them on one of the many elements of land warfare, when an alarm sounds.

"What the-?!" Larson yelled.

"Yellow alert! Everyone grab your gear, then deploy to the armoury, then meet at the briefing room. Denisovich, grab my weapons."

All the troops head for the armoury while Lampright moves to the command center.

"Sitrep?"

"As of three minutes ago, an unidentified airborne object was sighted. It's probably the fifth angel."

"Roger. We'll stand-by for Eva crash zone control."

Lampright reports to his quarters and grabs his gear, then heads to the briefing room.

1429 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Briefing Room, NERV Headquarters

Thirteen armed men in full combat gear wait in the briefing room.

"I just got a situation up-date. Eva Unit-01 deployed to neutralize enemy, and was damaged. The enemy is now attempting to drill through the 22 armour layers to destroy NERV HQ. Repairs are now being made to Unit-01, but the enemy appears to be undamaged by the Eva's attack. A new battle plan is now being formulated, and I put us on permanent stand-by until this is resolved. Or we die. I told them we'd stand by in the office, it's closer to the helipad and the motor pool. Let's move."

1534 hrs.Undisclosed Date

N-FOG Office

"Royal flush." Jaeger said with a grin.

"I'm out." Smith said.

"Me too." added Herford.

"How did you-damnit." Larson said and started shuffling the deck.

Everyone of the troops had found something to do. For Jaeger, Herford, Smith and Larson it was poker. Maloy was playing a game-boy, while Lampright and Cooper were talking and joking at the desk. Jackson was sleeping, next to Denisovich who was sharpening his bayonet. Sonoda wrote to his family while Howard and Montgomery played chess, leaving Carey to re-read a battered copy of "The Hitchhiker's Guide to The Galaxy".

Suddenly, Lampright's radio blared to life.

"Captain Lampright, report to the command center."

1633 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Command Center, NERV Headquarters

Jaeger is staring at the main screen.

"So let me get this straight. Your plan, as it is, is to use a never field-fired, experimental sniper weapon, at extreme range, operated by someone who's never even fired a real weapon before?"

"Will you help us or not?" Misato asked.

"Hell yeah." Jaeger said with a grin. "Alright your first prob will be finding a suitable spot to shoot from....."

1800 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Mt. Futago Temporary Base

""Sonoda, form-up around the bottom and west perimeter, Carey take the top and east. Denisovich, you're with Sonoda, and Jaeger's with Carey. Howard and Smith, stick with me. Break."

Lampright walks over to Captain Katsuragi.

"Site security is good to go, ma'am."

"Yeah, whatever, I'm kinda busy right now."

Lampright walks back to Howard and Smith.

"Stay sharp guys, I got a feeling something's gonna happen."

2354 hrs.Undisclosed Date

The thirteen men of N-FOG are watching the operation commence.

"Man, this is so cool. Alien creatures, giant robots, positron rifles, saving the world, it's like we're living in a frickin' anime, dude!" Cooper said.

"What are you-? That's it. Your talking privileges have been revoked." Lampright said.

"You can't take away my talking privileges!"

"I just did."

"But-"

"Talking privileges."

Lampright cracks a smile to cover what he's really thinking.

'Besides, in an anime the soldiers always die in the end.'

"Alright, here's the op run-down. That's a positron sniper rifle, 20 secs between shots. That's a part of a single stage orbital rocket. It'll last 17 secs under fire." Lampright said.

"Three sec difference." Carey said.

"Yeah, that's a long time." Smith said.

"I know, but it's the best they could do."

"So what now, cap?" Jackson asked.

"Now we just sit back and watch the show." Lampright said.

0000 hrs.Undisclosed Date 1

Mt. Fugato Temporary Base

Pilot Ikari fires at the angel.....and misses.

"Heh, well, that sucks." Maloy said.

"Great. So much for that idea." Smith said.

Suddenly the angel opened-up on the Evas.

"Holy shit." was all Cooper could think to say.

The troops watched as the rocket slowly melted through, when suddenly Unit-00 jumped in front of Unit-01, shielding it for the three seconds required. Pilot Ikari fired again, this time, his shot was true, destroying the angel. Unit-00 began to slide down the slope, until Unit-01 grabbed in and pulled out it's plug.

"Move to recovery! Move! Move! Move!" Lampright shouted, moving full speed to the sight where Unit-01 had set down the plug. Somehow or another, Captain Katsuragi ended up in front of them, and it took them almost two minutes to arrive at the site, where Pilot Ikari was carrying Pilot Ayanami.

"Smith! Take a look at her. Sonoda, move to hold Unit-01, Carey, move to hold Unit-00. Denisovich, go with Sonoda, and Jaeger, go with Carey." Lampright yelled. The troops moved out.

Within the next half-hour, Pilot Ayanami was airlifted to a NERV medical facility, the extent of her injuries largely unknown. By the time N-FOG was sent home at around 0600, both of the Evas had finally been recovered, and all of the top secret equipment had returned to where ever it belonged. Leaving the thirteen tired soldiers to police the area one last time before returning home. The soldiers entered NERV Headquarters and headed to quarters for some sleep as everyone else in the base began to wake-up.


	4. Security Measures

0147 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Just Outside of NERV Headquarters

The thirteen men of N-FOG are camouflaged in the brush.

"You really think we can take NERV headquarters? I mean, they have a lot of guards." Sonoda said.

"That's the point of this drill." Lampright says.

Lampright continues to look at the two surface guards, before turning to Jackson and nodding. Both men pull out their paint sticks sneak towards the guards, Lampright taking the left one and Jackson the right one. They both come up behind their guard, and jab the paint stick into the side of his neck, leaving a bright orange spot on the side of his throat.

"Dead." Lampright says as him and Jackson drag the bodies off into the brush.

Lampright makes a hand gesture and Howard speeds out of cover, moving to the surveillance camera's electronic box on the wall of the elevator housing. He jacks in a small, handheld computer and goes to work, eventually turning back and giving a thumb-up.

Lampright motions and the other eleven rise from the brush and the thirteen board the elevator. Lampright inserts his access key and they begin their journey downward.

"What did you do?" Lampright asked.

"I dug into their archive, pulled up footage from before you and Jackson made your move, and set about an hour's worth of it in a loop. Kid's stuff." he said

"Uh, yeah. Everyone clear on their duty? Command element take the control center. Carey, take the Eva pens. Sonoda, make a run on pilots Ikari and Soryu. Avoid firing if you can, but once the fire-fight starts, shoot everyone. Hu-ah?"

"Hu-ah." Everyone answers.

"Alright, let's show'em what a REAL attack would be like."

Lampright and Jackson take positions at the sides of the elevator, and as soon as the doors open, jump out and repeat their actions with the two guards waiting there. Lampright then uses an elevator key to lock the surface elevator at ground level. The groups split up and go their separate ways.

0150 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Outside Eva Pens, NERV Headquarters

Paint rounds fill the air as Carey's team makes a move to secure the Evas.

"Carey to all units, we are engaged. Repeat, we are engaged."

"Roger that." Lampright replies.

0151 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Residential Area, NERV Headquarters

Maloy and Herford run down to the end of the empty hall while Sonoda covers Jackson while he picks the electronic lock. Jackson suddenly gets the door open, and the two sneak into the darkness of the quarters, immediately pulling down their NOGs. Sonoda signals that he'll take the main bedroom, and Jackson takes the side room. Jackson gently makes a mark on each of the children's necks with his paintstick, while in the other room, Sonoda's doing the same to Captain Katsuragi. After which he awakens her, explains the situation, and tells her that she's dead.

Herford calls the elevator, and Maloy stands by with his M-249. The elevator arrives and the doors open revealing seven or eight NERV guards. Maloy opens up on them as soon as the doors begin to open, and kills them all within a second. Herford mimes shooting a rocket into the elevator, then takes an elevator key from his pocket and locks the elevator at it's current level.

"Sonoda here, primary objective complete, we also got the head of Ops. We are currently moving to secondary objectives."

"Roger that." Lampright said over the radio.

0152 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Command Center, NERV Headquarters

Lampright and his command element move down the hall using bounding advance, coming to the entrance to the control center. They all take up positions to cover Denisovich as he spends about thirty seconds in front of the door, about the time it would take to place explosives. At that point, everyone folds back to the door, and Lampright opens it with an override card. Lampright and Denisovich throw dummy grenades into the door, wait for the small pop of their detonation, and then storm the room, shooting all of the staff.

"Howard, can you undo what you did to their surveillance?" Lampright asked.

"Sure." Howard said as he sat at the console and began typing. Within seconds the surveillance system was running again.

"Alright. Smith, Jaeger, and Denisovich, watch the door. Howard, help me out with this. We're gonna find their troop deployments and radio them in to our HK team."

"Lampright to Carey and Sonoda. Sitrep."

"Carey here. Meet resistance. Cleared area and are currently holding objective."

"Sonoda, reporting in. All three marks have been eliminated. Moving to secondary objective."

"Outstanding. Carry on. Sonoda, stand-by for information regarding enemy force deployment."

"So what is the status of NERV, captain?" Gendo Ikari asked from the wall, where he was sitting with all the other 'dead'.

"Your main surface elevator is destroyed, as is at least one of your internal elevators. You are dead, as is your entire command staff, your operations chief, and both pilots Ikari and Soryu. Access to you Evas has been cut off, about two dozen of your security guards are dead, and the rest are being hunted. At the beginning of the exercise, we simulated cutting your means of external communications. All of your combat capabilities have been removed. All in all, you have done a miserable job defending NERV headquarters."

"The exercise is complete. Have your men report to the briefing room to debrief on the specifics of the assault, captain." Commander Ikari said.

"Yes sir."

"Lampright to all units, 'the cow is out to pasture'. Report to briefing room immediately. Out."

0256 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Briefing Room, NERV Headquarters

"And so, NERV is completely unequipped for an intrusion of any force or skill." Lampright finished his debrief by with that statement as he looked around, noticing that all but one the personnel present in the room bore one or more kill marks.


	5. Meet Asuka

1530 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Residential Area, NERV Headquarters

Lampright walks up the hallway beating on doors dressed in full combat gear.

"Field op! Let's go! Let's go! Let's go!"

The troops gear up and in minutes a group of thirteen men in BDUs and body armour are walking down the halls of NERV HQ to the armoury.

"Hello, Michaels." Lampright said to the armoury officer with a smile.

Michaels sighs.

"Standard weapons check-out captain?"

"Yep. I also need 1800 rounds of .50 cal."

The armoury officer starts handing the first of the thirteen body bags, each one containing one of the troop's weapons, ammunition, and grenades. The weapons are distributed and the troops gear-up as Lampright and Denisovich pile .50 cal ammunition boxes onto a push cart.

"So what's the deal, cap?" Jackson asked.

"'The deal', Jackson, is that we're acting as a convoy escort."

"What?" Maloy asked.

"You heard me. We're an escort, for a pick-up of one person."

"That's bullshit!" Larson said.

"You guys remember the first op we did?"

"Yeah, takin' down those guys that hi-jacked a van full of NERV techies."

"Exactly. NERV wants to avoid another incident like that. So we're going with the convoy. My team'll be in the point humvee, Sonoda's in the rear, and Carey's team'll be in the sweep humvee. All three vehicles will be equipped with .50's. We move out at 1700, arrive at 1745, pickup WILL take no longer than 15 mikes. We will arrive back here at 1845. Any questions?"

"Are we expecting any trouble?" Jackson asked.

"Not really. Intel doesn't have any threats in sight, but that doesn't mean they're not there."

1633 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Motor Pool, NERV Headquarters

The troops are running checks on the humvees when Lampright notices someone else enters the motor pool.

"Can I help you, commander Ikari?"

"Be careful, captain. The pilot is very important for the Evangelion project."

"Will do sir, we'll bring'er back. Don't worry."

"Oh, and captain....."

"Yes, sir?"

"When you pick her up, don't use the 'precautions' you used on the other NERV personnel you helped."

"Sorry about that sir, it was SOP."

"I'm sure it was." the commander says as he turns around and walks out.

Lampright turns back to his troops.

"Cooper, Herford and Smith, you're drivers. Denisovich, Maloy, and Larson, you're gunners. Grab your ammo and stow it. 600 rds. each. Also, Commander Ikari says we can't cuff the mark."

A chorus of various noises of disappointment follow.

"But what if she LIKES being cuffed, captain?" Maloy asked from the back, receiving a few hoots of laughter.

Lampright shakes his head. "I swear, every time I talk to you, I can literally FEEL the intelligence being SUCKED from my brain Maloy."

"It's a talent." Maloy said as he shrugged his shoulders.

As Lampright walks up to his humvee, he notices something.

"Alright! Who's been writing up false gigs on the PMCS?"

"What's it say, sir?" someone yells from out of view.

"Says, 'flux capacitor emits loud whine when engaged."

The other dozen troops found this to be very amusing.

"Yeah. What did I tell you guys about doin' that?"

"Only do it to vehicles we won't be using?" Maloy piped up.

"I-The-Do you-Damnit Maloy! Don't talk anymore!" Lampright said with a half grin.

"Alright, remember what we discussed. Everyone watch the buildings around you, but still keep an eye on the vehicle in front and behind you. Stay in radio contact. When we reach pick-up point, Cooper, pull left, Herford, pull right, and Smith, put the lead humvee the long way across the road. M-2 operators, stay on station. The rest of the teams will move out and secure a perimeter. Smith and Howard come with me. Jaeger stay and provide anti-sniper cover. Everyone clear on their duty?"

Everyone remarks to the affirmative.

"Alright. Let's finish our preps."

1746 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Tokyo-3

"Perimeter secure." the voice came over Lampright's headset.

"Roger." Lampright responded.

"Howard, Smith, let's go." Lampright said, motioning for the two soldiers to follow him.

"So, this chick's pretty hot, huh?" Smith said as they walked down the dock to the waiting U.S. frigate.

"She's 14, Smith." Lampright responded.

"Oh my god! AHH! Why?!" Smith yells as he beats himself on the helmet repeatedly.

"Hey cut it out, Smith. We don't want the pilot to think we're ALL assholes, do we?" Howard said.

Two marines stand at the top of the gang plank.

"I'm Captain Lampright, here to pick-up the pilot. Here's my papers." Lampright said as he pulls a set of folded papers from his pocket.

Both of the marines grinned happily.

"Oh, thank god. We're finally getting rid of her. Find the captain, he knows where she is." one of the marines said.

"Roger." Lampright said, as they walked to the bridge.

"Whaddaya think he mean by that?" Howard asked.

"Who knows? Their marines, their all a little....." Smith whistled and pointed at his head, making a circular motion with his finger.

Lampright smirks and shakes his head.

"Watch it Smith, there's more of them here than there are of us." Lampright said.

Through their talking they arrive on the bridge.

"Can I help you gentlemen?" the captain asked.

"Yes sir. I'm here for the pilot." Lampright said.

The captain breathes a sigh of relief. "Finally. I had her wait nearby. ASUKA!"

A good-looking red-head appears from around a corner.

"Ack?" she said.

"These men are here to take you to your permanent home."

"Fine! Come get my luggage."

Howard and Smith look at Lampright, who shrugs.

"Sure. How much luggage can she have?"

1755 hrs.Undisclosed Date

The three men struggle down the gang plank, each carrying three or four suit cases.

"Sure, how much luggage can she have?" Howard says in a mocking tone.

"Shut-up. Just shut-up." Lampright says.

The three men load the luggage into the lead humvee.

"What the hell is all that?" Jaeger asked.

"Shut-up." Howard, Lampright and Smith all say at once.

"'Excuse me uhhh, Captain." says a man with a heavy five o-clock shadow.

"What?" Lampright says, securing the luggage.

"If I'm now mistaken, you're going to NERV headquarters, right?" he said.

Lampright makes a hand motion and troops appear at his sides and behind him.

"What do you know and how do you know it? Talk fast." Lampright said, flicking the safety off his rifle.

"Hey-hey-hey! Simmer down. I work for'em. I'm just lookin' for a ride." he said, reaching into his pocket. He heard a rustle of movement and suddenly realized that he had three muzzles pointed at him.

"Pull your hand out of your pocket slowly." Lampright said, his weapon shouldered and aimed at Kaji. "Our briefing didn't say anything about anyone else from NERV being here."

The man slowly pulled an ID out of his pocket.

"Smith, check it." Lampright said.

Smith took the ID, looked it over intently.

"Looks legit. Says he his name is Kaji."

"Howard, call it in." Lampright said.

"Roger sir." Howard said as he grabbed the handset, put it to his ear and began talking to NERV.

"What are you doing to mister Kaji?!" Asuka yelled from behind Howard.

"Ma'am, this is between us, and him. Stay out of it." Lampright said without moving his aim.

Asuka tried to run to Kaji, but was grabbed and held by Jaeger.

"The cap said stay out of it."

"Hey, Lampright! HQ says he's good!" Howard yells.

Lampright lowers his weapon.

"Alright. You can ride with Sonoda's team in the rear humvee over there. Get in."

The man started to walk to the humvee on the right.

"NOOOO! Kaji! Don't leave me with them! Look at them! They're animals! They'll probably try to take advantage of me!" she yelled.

"You're frickin' 14! What the hell could we possibly WANT to do to you?!" Smith yelled.

"That wasn't what you said earlier." Howard whispered into the mic.

"Fold back to the vehicles." Lampright said into his mic.

"Uh, I'm not military, but shouldn't she ride in the MIDDLE vehicle where she'll be better protected?" Kaji asked.

"Not really. That's where any attackers'll expect her to be. Now, are there anymore 'questions', or can we get on with our job?"

1820 hrs.Undisclosed Date

"I can't believe they expect me to ride in such an undignified vehicle! It's unbelievable!" pilot Soryu yelled.

"I can't believe she's still talking." Jaeger whispered into his mic.

"Blah, blah, blah. She likes to talk, da?" Denisovich asked through the radio.

"Now I know why the Marines were so happy to get rid of her. She hasn't shut-up since we met her." Smith responded.

Howard waits until the pilot is facing the other way, then picked-up the roll of duct tape from the floor, holds it up, and gives Lampright a pleading look. Lampright thinks for a second, then shakes his head no.

"Why am I, Asuka Langley-Soryu, riding in a truck like a common peasant? I am the best Eva pilot in the world!" she yelled, continuing her ranting.

"If her fighting's half as good as her rants, we're in good shape." Jaeger said.

"Just 25 more minutes." Lampright muttered.

1843 hrs.Undisclosed Date

"Thank god we're here! Could you have driven any slower?" Asuka yelled.

"Seriously Smith, could you have?" Jaeger asked.

"Smith, you're a medical-type guy. Are you sure it's not possible to be nagged to death? Asuka might be considered a hostile." Howard said over his headset.

"I haven't read anything about it, but with her it's certainly a possibility." Smith responded as the men unloaded from the trucks.

"Alright, Denisovich, grab the cart and load up the .50 ammo. Howard, find another one and we'll load up princess' stuff and haul it to her room." Lampright said.

Lampright helped unload the .50 ammo, making sure it was all accounted for before telling Denisovich to take it to the armoury. Then Smith and Lampright began 'unloading' Asuka's luggage. Unloading consisting of Smith standing in the open trunk, picking-up the luggage and throwing it to Lampright, who caught it and loaded it onto a cart.

"What the hell are you doing?!" Asuka yelled from where she was hanging off of Kaji's arm.

"We're unloading your luggage, your majesty." Howard said from where he was holding the handle of the cart.

"Stop it! Kaji will unload it for me, right Kaji."

"Sure." Kaji said.

"Well in that case........" Lampright said and whistled, then made a motion to the door, causing everyone to leave the motor pool, leaving Asuka and Kaji alone, before someone turned off the lights.


	6. R&R

0323 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Residential Area, NERV Headquarters

"Up-and-at'em boys! Contingency sierra-bravo! Let's go, let's go, let's go!" Lampright yelled jogging down the hall banging on the twelve doors making up his men's bunks. Within thirty seconds, all twelve men, half-dressed, but wearing all their body armour and packing their pistols flooded the hallway and were on to their positions. Meanwhile, Lampright just leaned against a wall and listened to his radio. As each 'in position' report came, he glanced at his stopwatch and took note of the time on his clipboard. Lampright let them stay on station for about ten minutes.

"Lampright here, all troops return to barracks."

As the troops arrived he told them to stay in the hallway. When they had all arrived he checked his clipboard.

"Alright, guys. Gettin' better each time we do it. First of you reported in at 1:27 and the last reported in at 2:46."

The guys grin at each other and there's a couple of high-fives.

"And Larson, what is up with your time? You cut almost twenty seconds off your time."

"I was practicing in my off time. I used to get lost it's damn big in here, eh?" he replied.

"You get off time? I think I need to speak to your commander about that." Lampright said.

"You know the REAL reason he cut time off? Check out his feet." Montgomery said with a smile.

"Man, why you gotta cock-block me like that?" Larson said with a grin.

Lampright looked at his feet, seeing that he's wearing a pair of running-shoes spray-painted black.

"Yeah Larson, are those issue?" Cooper asks from the back.

"Hey, lay-off'im. It's a smart idea. I got a set of those next to my bed too. I mean, let's face it. None of you are exactly in uniform, so why spend extra time lacing-up when you can just stick your foot in? As a matter-of-fact, I suggest you all get a pair of running shoes, spray'em black if necessary, and use'em for the same thing. Now then, any questions about the deployment?"

"Yeah, during the real thing, where'd you be?" Jackson asked.

"I'd be in the control center coordinating you guys with security. Any other questions?"

"Yeah, why does Jackson smell funny?" Herford asked with a grin.

"Oh, a funny man huh?" Jackson said.

Before anyone could do anything the two men were playfully wrestling on the ground much to loud amusement of everyone else.

Lampright hangs around in the hall as the men trickle back into their rooms. As the last are leaving the hall, a very angry Captain Katsuragi comes appears in the hall from the room next to Lampright's.

"Captain." Lampright says with a nod.

"What the hell's been going on out here captain?!"

"A drill ma'am."

At this point, the conversation has attracted and held the attentions of the three or four soldiers still remaining in the hall.

"A drill?! At 3:30 in the morning?!"

"Yes ma'am." Lampright says, trying to keep from smiling, and sees the other troops start to.

"Men, return to quarters." Lampright says

"What the hell is you problem, people are trying to sleep! What kind of drill could you possibly need to do at 3:30?!"

"A contingency drill."

"Contingency of what?!"

"Contingency of a large-scale infiltration of the NERV facility."

"And you're doing this at 3:30 in the morning why?"

"Because the enemy never attacks when it's convenient. He's very inconsiderate like that."

"Lampright-"

"Ma'am if you're so concerned about noise levels, why don't we continue this conversation somewhere else?"

"Well, not it my quarters, OTHER people are trying to sleep in there."

"Fine." Lampright opens the door to his room and motions inside.

"After you, ma'am."

As he steps inside, he sets his LBV and helmet on a chair next to the door. Lampright's room is spartan, almost bare. The standard-issue furniture is there, with not much else. About the only new items were a shadow box with six pictures in it, a shelf full of manuals and a stack of papers on the desk, along with a picture of Lampright with his family and a picture of him with a very attractive girl. The phone and the T.V. both seemed untouched, as did the bed. The only things in the apartment that looked used at all were the desk and the bathroom. Lampright pulls out a chair for her and takes a seat across the table from her.

"Ma'am, permission to speak freely."

"Don't you already?"

"Ma'am, permission to speak freely."

She sighs. "Granted."

"Ma'am, do you have a problem with me?"

"What?"

"You've been busting my ass ever since you arrived. What is it? Me? My methods? What?"

"Well-I-everything you do is way outside of normal parameters. Carrying a weapon twenty-four-seven, early morning surprises, your cocky attitudes..."

"Yes ma'am, but all these are a necessity of the job. Our job is to support NERV, and we can best do that armed. The drills teach them to be ready on a moment's notice, and the attitudes.....well, I think they've earned them. They ARE the best. Which reminds me....."

Lampright gets up and pulls a large, thick, brown envelope from the stack of papers on his desk.

"Here ma'am."

"What?" she says as she opens it and looks inside.

"Contingency letters, ma'am. Each of us has written a letter to someone back home in case they don't make it back. It's in a stamped, addressed envelope. All you need to do is drop it in the mail. No muss, no fuss."

"Uh, shouldn't one of you keep it?"

"Oh, don't worry. If it gets bad enough that some of us won't make it back, none of us'll probably make it back."

"There's only twelve in here."

"I know."

"But there's-"

"Thirteen of us, I know. I don't have one it there. No one to send it to."

"What about your family or girlfriend or fiancé?"

Family's all dead. My parents, my brothers, all killed in the invasions following the chaos of the second impact. My parents where shot dead in their house by a death squad. My brothers were killed in separate engagements fighting with me in the guerrilla war waged until we were liberated. My fiancé left me a three days ago. Like I said, no one to send it to. Now then, back on subject. At the very least, could avoid bustin' my ass in front of my men? It's bad for discipline."

"Uh...alright."

"Outstanding. Glad to have that settled."

Lampright gets up and walks her out.

"Good night ma'am."

"Good night captain."

0806 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Cafeteria, NERV Headquarters

Thirteen men in PT gear plastered with sweat walk into the cafeteria. The men walk through the line, and sit together, idly chatting and ribbing each other while they eat. Cooper says something, and the entire baker's dozen of men burst out laughing, and Herford almost fell out of his seat.

"Can you shiestkoffs keep it down?! Some of us are trying to study!" pilot Soryu yelled from the next table.

"And why is it our problem you waited until 0800 to study?" Smith yelled back.

Pilot Soryu started yelling at them in German and Jaeger responded by yelling back in German.

Lampright suppressed a grin as he nudged Jaeger.

"Cut it out, we're guests, remember?." Lampright said.

Jaeger says one last remark in German, sending pilot Soryu running from the room.

Cooper, on the verge of laughter, elbows Jaeger.

"What'd you say?"

"I told her her mother was a whore."

Cooper falls backward out of his seat into the aisle, rolling with laughter.

"Dude Jaeger, you are such a cockbite." Lampright says between laughs.

Jaeger just shrugs.

Lampright scans the room, making sure Captain Katsuragi didn't see any of the preceding actions. While doing so, he noticed one of pilot Ikari's friends eying his pistol.

"Check out pilot Ikari's friend." Lampright whispered to Cooper.

"The one trying to act cool? Or the one with the glasses who keeps looking over here?"

"Yeah, the second one. I think he likes my pistol."

"Really? Why would he like that piece of crap?" Cooper said, looking down at his identical pistol.

"Yeah, right. Seriously, he's taken an interest in it, I can tell. I used to be the same way, remember? Watch this."

"Lampright?"

"Chill, I'll find out about those places we were looking for after the last op."

Lampright stands up, takes his tray, walks over to the table and sits down, and takes a bite.

"So, you like my pistol?"

"Yeah! It's an H&K, right?"

"Yep. Heckler and Koch Mark 23 SOCOM pistol."

"Wow! This is so cool!"

"Don't piss yourself, Aida." the pilot's other friend said.

"Hey, you guys know a good arcade and burger joint or pizzeria? Preferably ones open 24 hrs."

The pilot's second friend speaks up. "Just who da hell are you anyways?"

"Oh, my bad."

Lampright sticks out his hand. "Captain Eric Lampright, formerly of the United States Army Rangers, currently on load to the U.N., who loaned me to NERV."

"Wow! I'm meeting a real ranger! This is SO cool!" Aida said.

"Yeah. Umm, can you help me out with the arcade and food thing?"

"Uh yeah, sure....."

1023 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Firing Range, NERV Headquarters

The N-FOG members are filling the range with the sound of gunfire as they keep their marksmanship skills sharp.

Maloy taps Lampright on the shoulder to get his attention, then points at the door Captain Katsuragi is walking in through.

"Jaeger, if this is because of what you did, something very bad will happen to you."

Jaeger shrugs.

Misato walks up to Lampright, very angry. Lampright motions to the range control office, and they step inside so as to be able to converse without screaming over the gunfire.

"Can I help you ma'am?"

"What the hell did you or your men say to Asuka?!"

"I don't know ma'am. I don't speak German."

"Lampright-"

"Really ma'am, all I know is that she started taking an attitude with my men, and the next thing I know, her and my sniper are goin' dozens in deutch, alright?"

"Lampright, you need to keep a tighter leash on YOUR men."

"And you should keep a tighter leash on YOUR pilots. They shouldn't dish it if they can't take it. Now excuse me ma'am, I have to SUPERVISE the people under MY command. Good day." Lampright about-faces and walks out of the room.

Lampright waits until Misato leaves, then gets everyone's attention.

"Hey everyone, tomorrow, no work. Me and Coop are probably gonna hit up an arcade and grab some pizza or burgers, if anyone else wants to join us, go ahead, just be at the office at 1100."

"'Bout time we got a day off!" Montgomery yells.

"And Jaeger, boy are you in trouble."

"Uh-oh." Maloy said.

"Busted!" Herford yells from the back.

"Yeah, Jaeger's buyin' everyone lunch in the mess hall today."

"Damn it! That gets expensive!" Jaeger yells.

"Then stop gettin' me in trouble!"

Jaeger mock pouts, "But it's fun."

1100 hrs.Undisclosed Date 1

N-FOG Office, NERV Headquarters

Lampright, Cooper, Howard, Herford, Smith, Larson, Sonoda, Carey, Jackson, and Maloy gather at the office, all in civvies.

"Everybody got their weapons permits? Good. Beepers? Good. Money? Good. Then let's ROCK!"

The ten men enter the elevator to the surface.

"Hey Sonoda." Lampright says.

"Yeah?"

"This is your country, so uh, just keep me fm doin' anything stupid, alright?"

"Sure, sir. It never crossed my mind to do otherwise." Sonoda replied with a smile.

""Oh, damn Sonoda. You got your work cut OUT for you today!" Cooper said.

"Shut-up, fucktard." Lampright said.

"Jarhead." Cooper replied.

"Hey!" Maloy yelled.

Cooper and Lampright just grinned at each other.

"Man, I've missed these kinda times." Lampright said.

"I know what you mean. I haven't REALLY relaxed in months." Cooper added.

"So what's our ROEs?" Cooper asked.

"Whatever you can do without being arrested."

"Sweet!" Smith yelled from the back.

"Sonoda, you're gonna help us with that one."

"Happy to, sir." he replied.

The doors to the elevator open and the step onto the surface.

"And for the love of God, stop calling me sir! There's no rank today. We've in civvies, alright?"

"COOL! That means I can do THIS!" Cooper yells and frogs Lampright on the shoulder.

"Hey what the fu-OW! Bastard." Lampright strikes out like lightning and frogs him on the shoulder blade.

1334 hrs.Undisclosed Date 1

Somewhere in Tokyo-3

The ten soldiers are playing various arcade games. Lampright and Cooper playing a shooting game, Sonoda and Larson are playing DDR, Carey and Jackson are beating the crap out of each other on some fighting game, while Smith and Howard play a puzzle-game against each other, occasionally tossing obscenities at each other, Herford's in a driving game, leaving Maloy free to harass little kids by waiting until they put money in the machine and then popping in his money, allowing him to whip the crap out of ten-year olds on fighting games, much to his amusement. Eventually, the other eight gather around and watch Lampright and Cooper finish beating the last shooting game in the building. Suddenly they finish, slap a high-five, and put in their scores.

"Numba one again, bitch!" Lampright yells.

"Screw you!" Cooper says grinning.

"There Lampright, are you happy? You set the highest score for every shooting game here. You wanna eat?" Larson asked.

"Sure. Hey guys! Pizza or burgers?!"

0007 hrs.Undisclosed Date 2

Somewhere in Tokyo-3

The ten men are sitting around the table, drinking and singing loudly (and somewhat off-key).

"Oh, what is the malted liquor,

What gets your drunker quicker,

What comes in bottles or in cans?

BEER!

Can't get enough of it,

BEER!

How we really love it,

BEER!

Makes me think I'm a man!

I could kiss and hug it,

BEER!

But I'd rather chug it,

BEER!

Fill my belly up to here!

BEER!

I can not refuse it!

BEER!

I could really use a

BEER! BEER! BEER!"


	7. Synching The Pilots

0342 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Cafeteria, NERV Headquarters

The twelve of the members of N-FOG are sitting at a table together, eating and joking, when Lampright looks up.

"Hey, it's that pilot Ikari over there by himself?" he asks in a quiet voice.

"I think so.....yeah. Looks like he's in a mood too." Cooper said from where he was sitting across from Lampright.

Lampright speaks in a voice just loud enough for everyone at the table to hear him, but no one else, "Everyone, follow my lead."

Everyone does as Lampright does. First loading all their food on their trays, then standing straight up, and walking to Shinji's table, squaring their corners as they walk, before sitting down at the table, completely surrounding him.

"What's up?" Lampright says.

Shinji looks away. Lampright nudges Maloy.

"Have you ever watched midget porn, I mean it's-" he says.

Lampright elbows him harder.

"OW! Alright, alright. You like clowns?"

Lampright chambers his elbow.

"Jez man, I was just kidding."

Maloy suddenly turns his attention to Shinji.

"What's wrong dude? You look like someone pissed in your Cheerios™."

"I just.....I don't want to talk about."

"Ok, whatever. HEY! Is it true that you bunk with Soryu AND that hottie CO, the captain?" asked Maloy.

"'Cuse me?" Captain Lampright said.

"I didn't mean you. You're not a hottie. I meant the other captain. Uhhh, Katsuragi." Maloy said.

"Yeah, I share a room with Misato and Asuka." Shinji said.

"Has Asuka shut-up yet?" Smith asked.

"Yeah, I heard about that. I also heard about Lampright's bell-hop service." Cooper said.

"Yeah. I'm gonna hurt you." Lampright said.

"So seriously, has she stopped talking yet?" Smith asked.

"No." Shinji said.

"HAHA! I was right! Gimme my money Herford!" Smith yelled.

"Damnit!" Herford said from the end of the table, digging through his wallet.

Larson, the missing member, finally shows up and walks over to the table with his food. Lampright suddenly notices something on his cheek. Lampright stands-up, and gets in front of him, and comes to attention in his path as soon as he recognizes it. Larson comes to a modified attention, holding his tray with his left hand.

"Larson, what the hell is that on your face?" Lampright asked.

"It's a uh, an umm,....." Larson starts to mutter. "It's a penis sir."

"I can't hear you, Larson!"

"SIR, IT'S A PENIS, SIR!" Larson sounds off.

Everyone cracks up at this, several people fall out of their chairs, and the other NERV personnel just stare, having only heard the word 'penis' yelled loudly.

"Take a seat, Larson." Lampright said with a grin.

Larson sits down next to Lampright.

"A word of advice, pilot. Don't ever fall asleep in the break room if Maloy's around."

"Prove I did it." Maloy said.

"Just wait." Larson said before turning his attention to Shinji.

"Ain't he the one who bunks with the cap's CO and the other pilot who won't shut-up?" Larson asks.

"Yep." replied Howard.

"Then what's he so down about?! He's got two hot chicks in his quarters! I'd be the happiest 14 year-old around!"

"No you wouldn't." Smith says.

"Yeah, we all know you don't swing that way, Larson." added Maloy.

"Hey! I am NOT gay!" Larson replied.

"Says the man with the dick on his face." Maloy says.

Larson and several of the others spend several minutes going back and forth.

"Ignore the peanut gallery. So seriously, what's the problem? Come on, tell I'd rather not....."

"Well, alright. But if you change your mind, remember, I'm right next door. Just knock, and I'll hook you up, you got me?"

"Yeah, alright."

"Don't forget. And I don't just mean for personal probs. You need help with anything, you know, like school work or anything, I'll help. Or if you just wanna talk. It'd give me a chance to have an intelligent conversation for a change." the last part of Lampright's speech directed as much at the other twelve as it was at Shinji.

"Ok, sir."

"Your not in uniform, you don't have to call me sir. Call me Eric."

"Ok, Eric."

Lampright gives a half-smile.

Suddenly the alarms go off.

"Red alert!" Lampright yells, as the baker's dozen of soldiers drop their utensils and trays and run for the door.

"See ya, Shinji!" Lampright yells on his way out.

As soon as the troops exit the cafeteria, they separate. Lampright heads for the command center, while everyone else reports to the armoury.

0346 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Command Center, NERV Headquarters

"What's the situation, ma'am?" Lampright asked

"An angel has appeared." Katsuragi replied.

"So we are to prep for site security and pilot recovery?" Lampright asked, slightly disheartened at the prospect of no action.

"Yes. Carry on."

Lampright heads to the armoury.

"What's the mission?" Jackson asked.

"Security and recovery." Lampright replied as he turned to Smith.

"Bring a litter."

"Roger, sir." Smith replied.

Lampright draws his weapons and they head to their office, where they wait.

0354 hrs.Undisclosed Date

N-FOG Offices, NERV Headquarters

Howard is kneeling next to a TV pulled over next to a wiring box, pulling through the bundles with one hand, a pair of issue wire cutters in the other. The other dozen troops gathered around watching him intently.

"There you are." he muttered as he stripped the wires in the bundle one by one, splicing in a take-off as not to interrupt the normal workings of the system.

"You SURE you know what you're doin'?" Lampright asked.

"Don't worry, I used to do this all the time with the security cameras in the girl's locker room in high school." he replied.

After finishing with the wires, he spliced his take-offs into the end of a piece of severed coax cable. He unhooked the normal cable from the TV and hooked his doctored cable in it's place.

Howard motioned to Smith who held the remote.

"If you'd be so kind."

The TV comes to life, showing the Evas battling almost a hundred meters above them.

"SCORE!" Howard said as he high-fived Lampright, Maloy, Cooper and Montgomery.

"Bad-ass." Carey said.

"Howard, you are the man." Lampright said taking a seat.

"Now just sit back, relax, and watch the show." Howard said. "Anyone bring popcorn?"

"Speaking of which, I AM frickin' hungry." Lampright said.

"Same here." Cooper added.

"You think we can find a place that'll deliver?" Maloy asked.

"You mean deliver here, into a classified base, and now, while we are under attack by angel?" Lampright asked.

"Yeah." Maloy replied.

"Probably. But'll they'll charge us out the ass for it." Lampright said.

"It's cool. We can charge it to NERV, it's an expense. Everyone like Chinese?" Smith asked.

0358 hrs.Undisclosed Date

N-FOG Office, NERV Headquarters

Lampright yelled as the troops jumped at the sight of Unit-02 being tossed through the air like a leaf, right into Unit-01.

"Evas are down! Move to assigned elevator!"

Lampright assigned sectors as they moved to the elevators.

"Lampright, you are ordered to delay your recovery operation until further notice." Gendo's voice came over the radio.

"Roger."

"Alright, return to barracks."

0405 hrs.Undisclosed Date

N-FOG Office, NERV Headquarters

"So then she said 'No you idiot, that's my belly button!'" Maloy said.

Everyone cracked up.

"Oh my god, is that old." Lampright said with a smirk.

Suddenly, the room shook and the lights flickered.

"Holy shit! What the hell was that?!" Montgomery yelled.

"Somethin' big, maybe nuclear." Jackson said as he picked himself up.

"Lampright to command! What in God's name was that?!" Lampright yelled into his radio.

Gendo's voice came over the radio. "Calm down, captain. That was an N2 bomb."

"An N2 bomb? Damn." Howard said.

"You now have permission to deploy for recovery."

Lampright and his troops double-timed it to the elevator.

"Sonoda, take sectors between bearings 61 to 180. Carey, take 181-300. Command, we've got 301-60. Smith, be ready to move with me for pilot recovery."

"Roger that, sir." Smith responded.

The troops step on the elevator and ride to the surface. On the way up, Lampright pulls out a pair of thick leather work gloves from a pocket.

"What's with the gloves?" Cooper asked.

"The entry plugs. If I have to pull someone out, they'll be damn hot. It's to save my hands, dude."

The elevator opens, revealing several buildings crushed under the two tangled Evas, their entry plugs already ejected. The troops rapidly move off the elevator.

"Spread out and secure a perimeter! Smith with me!"

Pilot Soryu's sitting by her entry plug, dazed.

"Soryu." Lampright says.

She looks up, shocked.

"Is Ikari still in his plug?"

She nodded.

"Smith, how is she?"

"Shock. She'll fine in a while." he said.

"Good. We're goin' to get Ikari. Cooper! Get over here and monitor the pilot."

"Roger, sir." Cooper said over the mic and moved to their position.

Lampright and Smith moved over to the unopened plug, the heat radiating off it making the air above it shimmer. Lampright ran up to it and grabbed the release handles and pulled. Lampright could feel the heat from the handles seeping through his gloves as he strained against the handle. His hands began to burn.

"Fuck, ow."

The door handle suddenly gave way, and the door clattered to the ground. Lampright pulled off the smoking gloves and looked inside.

"Ikari?"

Moaning came from the interior of the plug.

"Smith! Get in here!" Lampright yelled.

Smith jumped inside of the plug and started examining the pilot while Lampright took up a position guarding the plug.

"How is he Smith?"

"He's fine. Come on, Shinji, up and at'em." Smith said from inside the plug.

"Alright. Get him over to Soryu."

By this time, Soryu had started ranting at Cooper.

Lampright moved over to Howard's side and took the handset.

"Lampright to Katsuragi. Perimeter secured. Pilots recovered. Requesting security detail to escort pilots back. Will stay on station until Evas are recovered. Out."

0523 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Outside of Dr. Ikagi's Office, NERV Headquarters

Lampright is leaning against a wall as Kaji exits the office.

"I hear NERV has a 'little problem.'" Lampright said.

"What do you want, captain?"

"Kaji, you seem like a nice guy, I mean, you put up with Soryu for a whole voyage, so I'm gonna help you out. I just want a favor in return." Lampright said.

"Ok, I'm game."

"Now, I'll give the best solution I've got for your 'little' problem, and in return, I want take-out for 26 people."

"You planning a party?"

"No, but about two people's worth of food each should take care of my people. Now then, for my part of the bargain. We once had to take two objectives simultaneously, I mean within seconds. So the two assault teams just spent the two previous weeks living together. We ate together, slept together, pissed together. It got to the point where we knew what someone was about to say, almost what they were thinking. We wanted to kill each other by the end, but we got the job done. You need to get the two pilots to the point where they can anticipate each other's movements."

"How do I do that in 5 days?" Kaji asked.

"Not a clue. I told you I had a solution, not an execution."

"What the hell?"

"I expect the food to be delivered to our office at 1200 hrs. on the dot. Make it Chinese. Thanks!" Lampright said as he turned and walked away.

1206 hrs.Undisclosed Date

N-FOG Office, NERV Headquarters

"I still can't believe you got all this food for us!" Cooper yelled between mouthfuls.

"It's a talent." Lampright responded between bites.

A voice came over the radio. "Katsuragi to Lampright, respond."

"Busteeed." Larson said from his chair.

"Lampright here. What do you need?"

"Report to my quarters ASAP."

"On my way." Lampright responded, looking longingly at the food he was leaving behind.

'I know better than to ask THEM to save me some food. ' He thought.

"Report to her quarters? Whew! Way to go Lampright!" Cooper yelled.

"I hate you." Lampright said in joking voice.

1209 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Capt. Katsuragi's Quarters, NERV Headquarters

Lampright comes to attention and knocks on the door, which opens after about ten seconds.

"Captain Lampright reporting as ordered, ma'am."

"At ease. Come in, captain."

Lampright steps inside as the captain closed the door.

"You requested my presence?"

"Yes, I've read your file, and it seems you have some experience with surveillance equipment, explain."

"Ma'am, I have a degree in computer hardware, giving me a background in how the equipment works. I worked for an electronics company installing covert cameras while in college. I have also had field experience with covert surveillance gear. May I ask what this is about?"

"This is because Kaji suggested a problem to our solution. I don't like it, but we don't have another choice. And your going to help me with it."

"I'm helping.....how?"

"The plan requires the two pilots to live with each other for five days. I want to be able to watch them with their knowledge."

"And having them live together was....Kaji's plan?"

"Yes."

'Bastard.' Lampright thought.

"Now, I want cameras in every room, will full visibility." she said.

"Every room? No way. I won't do the bathroom. I'll put in a mic, but that's it."

"Lampright-"

"No. I will not help you be a voyeur with 14 year-olds!"

"It's not like that!"

"Then a microphone should be sufficient."

"Fine. What do you need?"

"Well, first I'll need to see the apartment I'm wiring. Then I'll need a signed requisition form to withdraw the necessary equipment from NERV Intel."

1837 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Capt. Katsuragi's Quarters, NERV Headquarters

"Aren't you done yet?" Katsuragi asked impatiently.

"No. This is a science, you can't rush it. I mean, you want it done correctly, right? Besides, I haven't done this in a while. Cut me some slack." Lampright said from where was bent over a desk, connecting various wires and monitors.

Lampright had spent the last 15 minutes moving around monitors, and had removed his BDU top, leaving him to work in his undershirt.

'Hmmm. He's got a cute ass.' Captain Katsuragi thought to herself.

'Come to think of it, he is KINDA cute, in a rugged sort of way. If you like that. Why am I thinking about those things at a time like this?!' she mentally chastised herself.

"That should do it." Lampright said as he started to switch on the monitors.

Lampright plugged in the headset and pointed to a panel.

"My buddy Howard helped me set this up, I think you'll like it." Lampright said.

Katsuragi moved closer to get a better view.

"All of the mics are hooked into it. It detects which ones are getting feed, and automatically switches off the inactive ones, while piping the sounds picked-up by activated mics through the headphones, eliminating the need to manually switch mics. You can still do so of course with the controls above it."

"So you're done?"

"Think so. I just wanna test it." Lampright said as he sat in the chair pulled up to the desk.

Lampright talks into his radio mic. "Alright, start the walk through Howard."

Howard begins talking and moving from room to room at random, eventually covering all the rooms more than once.

Lampright leans back in the chair.

"Works perfectly. All yours, captain." Lampright said as he got up.

"Have fun." Lampright waved as he left her room. As he did so, she noticed the skin peeling off his fingers and palm.

"What happened do your hand, Lampright?!"

"Hmm?" Lampright looked at his hands.

"Oh, that. I burned it opening Shinji's plug. Those damn things get hot. Ruined a perfectly good pair of gloves. Which, by the way, NERV will be receiving a bill for. Any other questions?"

"C-Carry on."

0607 hrs.Undisclosed Date 5

N-FOG Office, NERV Headquarters

"So, they're supposed to be engaging today, right?" Herford asked.

"Yep. And as usual, we stand-by for recovery." Lampright replied.

The men seated themselves and watched the events unfold on their TV.

"Damn. Look at that choreography. That's good. How long did you say they had to practice?" Jackson asked.

"Five days." Lampright responded.

"OHH. Look at Jackson. Ballerina!" Carey yelled.

"No, I just have the ability to acknowledge talent." Jackson responded.

The conversation eventually quiets down, and they finish watching the engagement. The Evas finish off the Angels with a flourish. Suddenly Evas are in a heap again.

"Our time has come again!" Lampright yells.

The thirteen men double-time to the elevator.

"Is this all we're good for?" Howard asked on the way.


	8. Cavalry To The Rescue

2313 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Capt. Lampright's Quarters, NERV Headquarters

There's a knock on the door. Lampright looks-up from his paperwork.

"Come in." Lampright said.

Captain Katsuragi walked into the room.

"Can I help you, captain?" Lampright said without looking up.

"Some of the officers were gonna have a little party, and they thought you might wanna-"

"They?" Lampright asked unbelieving.

"Alright, I. I thought-"

"I don't attend other people's parties. It always goes...badly. That's why my boys and me have our own parties. You could come to one of OUR parties, if you want though."

"Alright, sounds fun. You don't know what you're missing, though."

"Oh, yeah, I bet you stiff-collar guys can get REAL wild after a couple of near-beers."

"Hey! It's NERV policy not to serve alcohol at it's functions."

"That's why I'm glad I'm not part of NERV. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to get up in just over five hours, so I'd like to get some sleep."

Lampright shows her to the door.

"Let's do this again sometime." Lampright said to her as he opened the door.

Katsuragi walked out and to her room next door. Lampright caught himself watching her hips and legs as she walked.

'Cut it out, man. That's a good way to get removed from duty!' Lampright thought as he shook his head, as if his brain were an etch-a-sketch and a mere shake could erase his thoughts from existence.

Lampright began getting ready for bed.

"She invited me to a party. Could she...? Nah. It'd be more obvious." Lampright thought aloud.

Capt. Katsuragi's Quarters, NERV Headquarters

All the lights are off as Katsuragi prepares for bed.

'God, I don't think he knows. How dense is this guy? I mean, I was pretty obvious.' she thought as she climbed into bed.

1809 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

Range Office, NERV Headquarters

Lampright reaches under his helmet and pushes his earpiece closer to his ear.

"Captain Lampright, go ahead."

"They what! All three of'em!"

"Lampright assemble your team, get your gear, and report for briefing. You need to move on this one ASAP." Capt. Katsuragi replied.

"Roger that. Lampright out."

Lampright turns on the line clear sign and steps out of the office.

"Grab your guns and gear and report to the armoury for ammunition draw!"

"What's the OPORD?" Jackson asked.

"I'll tell y'all as soon as I know, believe me."

1823 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

Briefing Room, NERV Headquarters

"So you're telling me that all THREE pilots, Ikari, Soryu and Ayanami, were abducted, in broad daylight, from a school, in the middle of the frickin' city, WHILE they were under guard!"

Katsuragi sighed.

"That's how it appears." she said.

"Who the hell is guarding these kids!"

"Up until now, the threat hasn't been a serious one. NERV didn't put a lot of resources into guarding the pilots."

"Hasn't been serious! There was an abduction of NERV personnel before the pilots even arrived, and you're telling me that the pilots being guarded was unjustified!"

"Captain, I feel as bad about this as you, but can we please concentrate on the matter at hand? We need to get these pilots back safely."

"Alright, we'll discuss this later. Where are they?"

"They've been traced to an airfield outside the city that's been abandoned since the second impact, here." she said pointing to a pin on the area map.

"So they're going to try to remove them from the area. That doesn't leave us much time to act." Lampright said.

"Now wait a minute, there's no proof of that."

"And there's no proof that they aren't. We'll assume they will. We can be ready to move inside of an hour. When can our helos be here?"

"Helos?"

"Yes ma'am the facility is within helo range, and the tree's shield the 'bird and block it's noise. Plus the pilots can be quickly evacuated that way. Planes are pretty much insertion only tools, vehicles won't be able to operate in the surrounding forest, and foot's too slow. That leaves helos. Now, can I get a map of this airfield?"

"Here." Katsuragi replied handing a rolled-up paper.

"Outstanding." Lampright said as unrolled it and laid it on the table.

Lampright talks into his mic. "Lampright to Denisovich. Move the men to the briefing room."

Within minutes all thirteen of the men were in the room. Lampright pointed to the map, then began his planning session.

"Alright, our mission is to insert, probably by helo, into an abandoned airfield, rescue three hostages, and extract. I want none of the enemy to survive this, Commander Ikari's orders. Now, let's get input on the plan. Part of our plan is to deploy ASAP, but to wait if possible. Now, the metabolic low-point for the human body is around 0400-0500. If we can, we'll wait until about 0430 and strike. Due to how the objectives are spread out, everyone will have a different view. If you see anything you think requires an immediate execution, give the order. I'm relying on you guys since I can't see everything from my position. Just make sure you know the situation. Now, here's what I have worked out for the plan, but if y'all have any ideas, by all means share. So far, the plan calls for us to fast-rope in here..."

2004 hrs. Undisclosed Date +1

Aboard Helo inbound to Point Tango-Niner-One

"Everyone remember their part?" Lampright asked over the noise inside the helo.

Everyone flashes a thumbs-up.

"Carey?" Lampright asked.

"Sir, we clear and hold the hangars and then check the helipad for booby-traps and obstructions." Carey said.

"Hu-ah. Sonoda?" Lampright said.

"We take Jaeger, move up to the 'tower, clear it, and establish an over watch position in it." Sonoda replied.

"Roger. And my team will take point, clear the building, and grab the targets. Everyone clear on their mission and everyone else's mission?" Lampright checks the thumbs-up.

"Good." Lampright said.

"Hey Lampright, how come you get to assault?" Montgomery asked.

"Look Monty, we all agreed that the results of any rock-paper-scissors would be final. If you don't like it, tough." Lampright responded.

Suddenly the co-pilot turns around in his seat.

"Five mikes out." he said and turned back to his instrument panel.

2009 hrs. Undisclosed Date +1

Point Tango-Niner-One

"Ropes, ropes, ropes." Lampright's voice came over the headset.

Carey's team, having the farthest to go to their objective, roped out first and began circling around about thirty meters inside of the treeline. The assault element was next, moving to just behind the building, inside of the treeline. Sonoda's element was last, having the shortest distance to travel. They moved to an observation point just inside of the treeline. Lampright's and Sonoda's element waited at their points until Carey squelched over the radio, signaling he was in position. The radio static clicked on, then off, twice. Lampright's element took positions in concealment and prepared for a wait of more than six hours.

0430 hrs. Undisclosed Date +2

"It's time. Let's move." Lampright whispered into his mic.

The assault elements moved from cover and made their way to their first waypoint. Lampright slung his rifle, pulled out his pistol and screwed on the silencer.

"Assault element, moving out." Lampright whispered into the mic.

The team moved out across the darkened airfield with Lampright at point. The team approached from behind the airfield office building. As they lined up behind the corner, Lampright motioned for them to wait for a signal before coming around the corner. Lampright handed his rifle to Denisovich and quietly stuck around the corner. The soft clinking of four empty cartridges hitting the ground was followed by a pair of heavy, dull thuds.

"All clear." Lampright whispered.

Denisovich, Howard and Smith came around the corner, Smith staring at the two corpses and gently kicking the nearest one in the head. As they lined up for takedown, Lampright used hand motions to show them where the helipad was. Lampright took his rifle from Denisovich. He opened the breach on his underslung shotgun part-way, pulled a white-cased shotgun shell from his vest and inserted it into the chamber. Lampright flashed a thumb-up and waited for everyone else to return the gesture. Howard and Smith took positions on opposite sides of the door and each pulled out a flash-bang grenade and pulled the pin.

"Three." Lampright whispered.

Lampright readjusted his aim at the door.

"Two."

A pair of pinging noises sounded as Smith and Howard released the spoons on their grenades.

"One." Smith and Howard shifted slightly.

"GO!" Lampright shouted as he fired the door-buster round into the cheap metal door, blowing it against the wall opposite it. Howard and Smith threw in their bangers, as Lampright ducked out of the doorway and chambered the next shell in his shotgun. A second later, dual bangs sounded, and Lampright ran into the first room, firing a 3-round burst into the chest of a man holding an AK-74. As previously planned, Denisovich and Howard began clearing the ground floor, as Smith and Lampright moved to the second floor. Automatic weapons fire and explosions filled the night air as the three teams simultaneously engaged and neutralized their targets in separate parts of the facility. Lampright and Smith ran to the stairs as Howard and Denisovich moved room to room. Lampright threw a flash-bang onto the landing and charged up the staircase as soon as it detonated. Most of the gunmen where stunned and had dropped their guns to cover their ears. One was firing randomly as Lampright entered the second floor. He felt a tug on his left shoulder but ignored it.

'Probably a splinter.' he thought as he opened fire first on the shooter.

Smith was closely following him and opened-up, between the two of them they gunned down every terrorist in the room. Lampright and Smith cleared down the hallway, Lampright on the right, and Smith on the left. Most on them were empty, but some held equipment or bedding. They finally came to a door at the end of the hall. Lampright nodded to Smith, who readied a flash-bang as Lampright loaded another door-buster round into the breach of his shotgun. Smith released the spoon, and Lampright counted to two, then blew the door off it's hinges. The grenade went in and detonated, and Smith and Lampright charged into the room, weapons at their shoulders. They identified and neutralized targets as they appeared. Lampright saw movement out of the corner of his eye and looked. One of the terrorists was holding Asuka by the neck and had a gun to her head as the other remaining one moved next to him, stunned and weaponless.

"Drop the fuckin' weapon, or I'm gonna fill you so fulla lead you'll jingle when you hit the fuckin' ground!"

"Put your gun down, or the girl gets it!" he yelled.

"Drop the gun. You won't make it out of here. I've got eleven other guys, plus a sniper." Lampright said, not moving his weapon an inch from where it was held against his shoulder.

'Only got one chance. Gotta keep him distracted while I draw a bead.' Lampright thought.

"Come on, think about it. How you gonna get out of here? We've already killed all your friends, and we've got a helicopter. How far do you think you'll get before we-"

BANG. A single shot rang out in the room, it's volume in sharp contrast to the dulled and muffled shots coming from all around the complex outside the window. The terrorist's head exploded, red and pink and grey flying in all directions. The sound of the shot echoed in the small room as Asuka broke out of her shock and let loose a piercing screech.

"AAAHHHHHHHH!"

The last terrorist threw up his hands and began screaming.

"Shut-up! Lampright yelled and kicked his feet out from under him.

Smith ran up and put a pair of riot cuffs on his wrists before he moved to check the door way leading off from the room.

"Lampright, the other two pilots are in here!" he yelled.

"Lampright to all units. Marks are secure. Repeat, marks are secure." Lampright said into the mic.

"Roger that, control tower secure. When you're done, you'll want a look at it, though. And bring Carey." Sonoda said.

"Carey, you?"

"Area cleared and secured. IR strobes in place and activated. Ready to direct helo as soon as you give the signal."

"Denisovich?"

"Da, floor clear. Moving to your position."

"Outstanding! You and Howard hold the ground." Lampright replied.

"Asuka! Asuka! Calm down!" Lampright said.

"GET AWAY! GET AWAY!" she yelled at the phantom Lampright appeared to be, dirty, bloody, and not an inch of flesh visible behind his gloves, BDUs, baclava and goggles.

Lampright suddenly realized the problem. He grabbed Asuka by the shoulder with his left hand, and pulling down his baclava with his right hand.

"Asuka, it's me, Captain Lampright. You're alright."

Asuka paused for a second then composed herself.

"La-Lampright?"

"Yes. Calm down. We've here to take you home." Lampright said.

"Lampright? Why ya 'spose Asuka was separated from the rest of 'em?" Smith asked.

"Dunno, maybe they were quest-"

Lampright suddenly noticed that her skirt and blouse was torn.

"Did they do that?" he asked in the 'quiet angry voice'.

She nodded and looked at their prisoner.

"Him?"

She froze.

"Did he..."

"N-n-no."

"Right then." Lampright said as he got up.

"Smith, get the pilots out of that room."

"Alright." Smith asked, unsure of what was going to happen.

"Get-up." Lampright said to the prisoner who was lying on his stomach.

"Get-up!" he yelled and kicked him hard in the chest.

Lampright grabbed him by the riot cuffs holding his hands behind him, pulling his arms almost up to his neck, and dragged him into the other room and closed the door. There was a lot of muffled, incomprehensible yelling, in both Lampright's and the prisoner's voice. Then a soft clink. Then silence. Lampright walked out of the room.

"Let's go."

'Let's see what Ikari's made of.' he thought.

"Howard, help Ayanami. I'll take Soryu. Ikari, just follow us. You alright with that?"

"Ye-yeah."

"Good just follow us and you'll be fine."

They moved down the stairs and moved to the hangar right next to the helipad while Denisovich and Howard covered them. After they reached the building, Lampright called Denisovich and Howard over to their position.

"Howard, call in the bird. I'm going to the 'tower. Carey, with me."

"Roger that." Howard said as he grabbed the handset.

Lampright sprinted to the tower and climbed the stairs with Carey in tow.

"What's the problem?" Lampright yelled as he climbed the last flight of stairs.

"Check this shit out." Sonoda said.

"Holy shit. Carey whaddaya make of all this?" Lampright asked, making a sweeping gesture across the tables full of top-of-the-line equipment in the tower.

"Advanced radar, weather systems, control units, wow. This is nice gear." Carey said.

"Yeah, well, not any more." Lampright said, firing his shotgun into the nearest machine.

The others took Lampright's cue and within fifteen seconds all the equipment had been reduced to scrap.

"Let's go. That helo should be here any minute." Lampright said.

0501 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

The thirteen soldiers and three pilots are sitting in the airborne helo. Lampright turns to the three pilots before talking.

"Are you all alright?"

Ikari and Ayanami both nodded.

"Asuka, you alright?"

"I'm fine! But who's going to pay for my new clothes! YOU got blood and brains all over them!"

Asuka, obviously better, continued to rant.

"Why did you ask her that?" Cooper said through his mic.

"Shut-up." Lampright responded.

'This is what I get for being a nice guy.' Lampright thought as he leaned back against the skin of the aircraft.

"Hey! Look at the sunrise!" Ikari said.

The thirteen troops, their attention now grabbed, all peer out the window.

"Wow. I've forgotten how nice that thing looks." Lampright said quietly.

0559 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

Captain Katsuragi was waiting on the helipad when they landed. The pilots left the helo first, then the troops, and Lampright last.

"Ma'am, all pilots are accounted for, ma'am." Lampright said.

"Great." she said and smiled.

"Oh my God! What happened to your shoulder!" she yelled.

"Huh?" Lampright said looking at his shoulder and noticing the wound for the first time.

"Shit. That looks bad." Lampright said gently poking it with his right index and middle finger.

"What looks bad?" Smith said from the gaggle moving into the building.

"Hey Smith, whaddaya make of this?" Lampright asked showing him his shoulder.

"Shit. That looks bad." Smith said.

"What the hell happened to you!" Katsuragi yelled.

"I got shot, apparently." Lampright said.

"Come on Lampright, we're goin' to the infirmary." Smith said.

"Yeah, after I finish turn-in."

"No now. Come on."

"I don't like you, Smith. Denisovich, take over."

"Da." Denisovich replied.

Lampright and Smith handed-off their weapons and headed to the aid station.

0933 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

Lampright is sitting in his office, typing his AAR on a laptop. Captain Katsuragi suddenly opened the door to the N-FOG office and stuck her head in.

"Lampright?" she called.

"Yes?" he replied in an exasperated voice.

"How's your arm?"

"Fine. The bullet actually missed everything important. Instead of passing through, it lodged in the flesh in my shoulder. Apparently they don't make 5.45 like they used to."

"You must be pretty down."

"I've been better. Although I do have a cool souvenir now." Lampright said as he pointed to the inside of the empty NERV coffee mug on his desk.

Katsuragi looked inside, and saw a slightly deformed bullet.

"I've got something that'll cheer you up!" she said with a smile.

"You finally found a way to shut-up Asuka?" Lampright asked hopefully

No. Do you want to tell the pilot's guards what you thought of them?"

"Can I?" Lampright asked with a tone of evil glee.

"Yeah. I'm not good at chewing out other people. I figure you are though!"

"Outstanding. Gimme fifteen minutes."

"Meet me outside their office at 0955. I'll be waiting for you."

Lampright gives a thumbs-up.

1000 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

Security Office, NERV Headquarters

Lampright walks into the security office wearing a starched set of BDUs with corners sharp enough to cut paper and his face set in a frightening scowl. He avoids looking at them, but points in their direction as he looks at Katsuragi.

"Are these the fuck-ups?"

Katsuragi nodded once. Lampright's scowl intensified as he moved next to the first of the two guards. He set his face an inch from the side of the guard's cheek and, while maintaining the same distance, moved himself around until he was staring the guard straight in the face. His rage was almost palpable in the room. A bead of sweat dripped from the first guard's temple.

"WHAT THE HELL IS YOUR MALFUNCTION BOY!"

"Si-sir?" the guard stammered.

"DON'T FUCKIN' PLAY DUMB WITH ME BOY! Then again, maybe you ARE THAT DUMB! YOU WERE THE RANKING GUARD ON THE DETAIL PROTECTING THE PILOTS YESTERDAY, AM I CORRECT!"

"Y-yes sir."

"I CAN"T HERE YOU! YOU ARE APPARENTLY INCAPABLE OF DOING EVEN THE SIMPLIEST JOB PROPERLY, DOES THAT INCLUDE SOUNDING OFF TOO, MAGGOT!"

"Sir, no sir!"

Lampright switches to the next guard.

"AND YOU! WHAT THE HELL IS YOUR EXCUSE!"

"Sir, no excuse sir!"

"YOU"RE DAMN RIGHT NO EXCUSE!" Lampright yelled in his face.

Lampright backed off and stood in front of the two troops.

"NOW, would one of you like to EXPLAIN to me how they managed to kidnap THREE pilots from under your guard, in BROAD DAYLIGHT, IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FUCKING CITY!"

"Sir! I accept full responsibility for the failure, sir!" the first guard said.

Lampright suddenly turned to him.

"OH! WE GOT A GOD-DAMN HERO! WELL FUCK-UP, FIRST THING YOU LEARN AS AN OFFICER, BEING RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR SUBORDINANTS AND THEIR ACTIONS IS NOT ENOUGH! YOU MUST BE WILLING TO TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE RESULTS OF THEIR ACTIONS!"

Lampright unbuttoned his BDU top and pulls aside his undershirt revealing the large wound on Lampright's left shoulder.

"THIS IS WHAT INCOMPETANCE CAUSES! YOU GOT LUCKY! IF ANYONE ELSE HAD LAUNCHED THAT RESCUE, THOSE PILOTS WOULD BE DEAD!"

Lampright closes the gap between himself and the first trooper.

"IT'S GOOD YOU TOOK RESPONSIBILITY."

Lampright backs off about an inch.

"I'M DOCKING YOUR PAY TO COVER THE AMMUNITION EXPENDITURE!" Lampright yelled as he put back on his BDU top.

"Now, explain to me how you managed to loose the three pilots."

"Sir! We lost the pilots when we were following them on their way home! They turned down an alley our chase vehicle couldn't fit through! We speed around to where the alley should have let out, but they weren't there sir!"

"YOU LOST LINE OF SIGHT ON THE TARGET BECAUSE YOUR VEHICLE COULD NOT FIT DOWN A GOD-DAMN ALLEY! WHAT IN THE NINE CIRCLES OF HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU! GOD FORBID YOU TAKE YOUR THUMB OUT OF YOUR ASS, AND DO YOUR JOB!"

Lampright again put his face an inch from the guard's face.

"Why the hell wasn't the order to dismount and follow given?"

"Sir! I was afraid that picking-up the other guard would cause us a delay that could slow us down, sir!"

"OH! And you were afraid to cause a delay, because you were afraid you'd lose the mark?"

"Sir, yes sir!"

"Oh, and that worked REAL well for ya, didn't it ass gremlin?"

The guard swallowed hard.

"Sir, no sir!"

"Well, MAYBE IF YOU WERE IN BETTER PHYSICAL SHAPE, AN ALLEY RUN WOULD NOT BE A PROBLEM, NOW WOULD IT, COCK JOCKY! STARTING NEXT WEEK, IF YOU WISH TO KEEP YOUR JOB, YOU WILL REPORT EVERY DAY FOR THE NEXT WEEK TO THE OUTSIDE OF MY OFFICE IN PT GEAR AT 0500! DO YOU UNDERSTAND!"

"Sir, yes sir!"

"YOU ARE BOTH LUCKY THAT I HAVE NO MORE POWER OVER YOU! IF YOU WERE MY TROOPS I WOULD HAVE HAD YOU COURT MARSHALLED! I CAN'T UNDERSTAND WHY YOU ASSHOLES HAVEN'T BEEN! YOU ARE DISMISSED!"

The two troops almost scramble to get out of Lampright's way and leave the room. As soon as the door closed Lampright let loose a smirk.

"That was fun."

"Fun! You completely terrified them!" Captain Katsuragi yelled.

"I know." Lampright said in a satisfied voice as his smile grew.

"And docking his pay! Do you even HAVE that ability?"

"NO, but I thought it would scare'im."

"You are such an ass sometimes." Katsuragi said as she shook her head.

"I know." Lampright said as he went out the door.

1426 hrs. Undisclosed Date +2

N-FOG Offices, NERV Headquarters

Lampright activated his radio.

"Lampright to Katsuragi."

"Yes, captain?"

"You still wanna come to one of our parties?"

"Yes. When?"

"Tonight. 2200 hrs., our office. Dress in civvies, bring a set of rank pins."

"Why the rank?"

"It's a tradition. Just do it."

"Ok. ten p.m. it is." she said and turned off her radio.

'It's a date.' she said and giggled.

2201 hrs. Undisclosed Date +2

N-FOG Offices, NERV Headquarters

Loud music emanated from the office, while Lampright leaned against a wall outside.

"'Bout time." he said as Misato walked up.

His jaw dropped slightly as he saw her in a short skirt and tight shirt.

"Close your mouth. You'll catch flies." she said with a smile.

"Uh, yeah." Lampright said, regaining control of himself.

As they walked into the room, Lampright pointed to a small bin filled with various ranks set on a small table by the door. Lampright motioned towards it with a nod and flipped a set of U.S. captain's rank into it. Misato opened her hand and placed her rank in the bin. The room was filled with beer, loud rock music and other various party activities. Everyone was slightly buzzed. As they stood around observing the party, a man in a ski mask ran in the door with a water gun in each hand and started blasting at the party-goers.

"I got'im!" Lampright yelled and tackled him.

"Gotcha Smith." Lampright said as he pulled off the ski mask.

"Damn it. How'd you know it was me?"

"Dude, you were the only one missing."

"Oh yeah."

Several of the men had sat down and were watching the helmet cam footage.

Herford and Montgomery were ribbing each other over a game of darts. While Maloy told his same off color jokes. Lampright approached Carey.

"Hook me up with a beer, man. And one for the lady." Lampright said.

"Incoming." Carey replied and threw two beers at Lampright who handed to Misato.

Jackson suddenly appeared beside Lampright.

"What's up Jackson. And how many times to I have to ask you to STOP DOING THAT!"

"Sorry man. Hey, why was your helmet cam shut off from 0436-0439?"

"NTK basis, man." Lampright replied.

"Alright." Jackson said.

"NTK?" Misato asked.

"Need-to-know." Lampright replied.

Suddenly everyone's attention was drawn to Howard, who had jumped up on a table holding Lampright's rank.

"Hey! Look at me! I'm Lampright! I'm INVINCIBLE!" Howard yelled.

"Oh no, he did NOT just do that." Lampright said, crossing the room and grabbing Howard's staff sergeant rank.

Lampright ran to the table, pushed Howard off, and jumped up himself.

"Hey! Look at ME! I'm Howard! I'm a cock-bite!"

Misato giggled.

The party went downhill from there.


	9. The Day After

0743 hrs.Undisclosed Date +3

Capt. Lampright's Quarters, NERV Headquarters

Captain Katsuragi was awakened by noise outside the room. As she awakened, she was surprised by the unfamiliar room she was sleeping in. She was also curious as to why had slept in her clothes. She got up, causing the pounding in her head to intensify. As she straightened her clothes, the events of the previous night flooded back to her. Or at least what happened before the drinking started. She stuck head out the door as she tried to remember exactly how she had got here, where ever 'here' was.

"Hello?"

"So your awake, captain." Lampright said.

"Wh-what happened?"

"You got wasted last night. I mean damn! I've never seen ANYone out drink Cooper. You must've had like, four bottles of sake. You were frickin' DRUNK." Lampright said from where he was sitting on the couch where he had slept.

Katsuragi looked around and blushed.

"Did we ummm...you know...?"

"No. You passed out cold. I had to carry you. I would have left you at your place, but nobody would open the door. Why do you ask?"

Realizing what she said, Katsuragi blushed even more.

"N-no reason."

Lampright opens his fridge.

"Want somethin' to drink?"

"Uh, sure."

"Root beer, beer, juice or water?" Lampright says with his head hidden behind the fridge door.

"Beer."

"Alright. Yebisu, right?" Lampright says coming back from the fridge with bottle of water and a can of beer.

"Uh, yeah, how did you-"

"I noticed the high number of them in your trash. I stay alive by being observant." he said as he handed her the can and opened his bottle of water.

The two sat drinking in silence for a several minutes before Lampright stood up.

"Well, I've gotta meet with my troops for breakfast, so I'm gonna have to see you out."

"Uhmmm, ok. Thanks."

"Yeah. Let's do it again sometime."

0800 hrs.Undisclosed Date +3

Cafeteria, NERV Headquarters

The thirteen members of N-FOG arrive, all wearing civvies. As they entered the room, they noticed Shinji eating alone. The troops filed through the line, and took seats surrounding Shinji. As they sit down, they notice he's looking kind of freaked out.

"You ok, man?" Cooper asked.

"I-I'm fine." he said without looking up.

"You a little freaked out about yesterday, right?" Lampright said.

Shinji was silent.

"It's cool dude. I threw up after my first time in combat."

"Really?" Shinji said.

"Yeah, my lieutenant colonel came by and asked me if I was alright, because he knew it was my first time under fire. And I barfed all over his boots."

There were several snickers and Cooper struggled to stay in his chair. Lampright ignored them.

"Hey man, I know you're freaked out. It's natural, you'll be cool in a few days." Lampright told him.

"Yeah. It'll be cool, man, don't worry." Jackson said.

"Tell you what. Since the guards here are incompetent, we're gonna provide security. I'm gonna walk you to school today. Well, you and Ayanami and...sigh Soryu too."

Lampright turns his troops.

"Carey, Sonoda, your teams'll pull site security with me once we arrive. Command element, stay with in the chase vehicle to provide mobile support. Pack some SMGs."

Suddenly Katsuragi's voice came over the radio.

"Captain Lampright, report to my office, NOW."

"Oh shit." Lampright said.

"Wow. She sounds pissed." Cooper said.

"Thank you, COOPER." Lampright said as he got up.

0745 hrs.Undisclosed Date +3

Captain Katsuragi's Office, NERV Headquarters

"Lampright, would you like to explain this!" she asked, loudly slamming down his AAR report.

"It's my debriefing report, ma'am." Lampright said innocently.

"You know Asuka wants you to replace the cloths she was wearing because you got that terrorist's blood all over them?"

"Yeah, I bet she does." Lampright responded.

"Why did you take that shot, captain?"

'Oh, jeez.' Lampright thought.

"Because I thought I could make it."

"You THOUGHT you could make it! There was someone's life at stake!"

"They were gonna kill her anyway." Lampright said.

"You don't know that!"

"These guys were pros, and the kids had seen their faces. They weren't gonna let them live. Look, MA'AM, I don't tell you how to fight Angels, so don't tell me how to conduct a raid! Is there anything else?"

"Why are you wearing civvies, Lampright? Don't you have WORK today?"

"Ma'am, we're doing pilot security." Lampright managed to say with a straight face.

Captain Katsuragi's face turned the color of a tomato.

"WHAT! AFTER WHAT YOU JUST DID! UNDER WHO'S AUTHORIZATION!"

Lampright savored the moment about to unfold.

"Ma'am, under the authority of Commander Gendo Ikari, N-FOG is to replace the normal pilot security detail until a full investigation can be made into the circumstances leading to the abduction of the pilots, ma'am. May I leave now?" Lampright said without a trace of a smirk.

Katsuragi sighed.

"Get out."

Lampright got exited the office and closed the door behind him. After he left, Dr. Ikagi enter Katsuragi's office from the adjoining space.

"It really is shameless." she said.

"Yeah, he really is reckless." Katsuragi said.

"Oh no. I completely agree with him. I was referring to the way you two flirt."

"RITSUKO!" Katsuragi yelled.

Hallway, NERV Headquarters

As he left, Lampright saw Cooper leaning against the wall.

"God, Lampright, the way you two fight, when was the marriage?"

"Have I told you how much I hate you lately, Cooper?"

0843 hrs.Undisclosed Date +3

Streets of Tokyo-3

'Carey's team should be in position around the school. Sonoda's should be following us at a distance, not like I could see tell them through these crowds.' Lampright thought as he casually scanned his surroundings, trying not to subconsciously reach for the pistol hidden under his long coat.

"What's it like?" Shinji suddenly asked.

"Huh?" Lampright asked, surprised by Shinji's sudden outburst.

"What's it like in combat?"

"Come on Shinji, HE'S a fearless soldier in the American army. He just kills for a living." Asuka said in an omniscient and scornful tone.

"And that's why I'm not replacing your cloths." Lampright said.

Asuka responded by sticking her tongue out at him. Lampright responded by using his middle finger to pull down his right eyelid and turned back to Shinji.

"It's kinda hard to describe. It's like a super adrenaline rush. I mean, theres fear, but there's also a feeling of exhilaration, too. It's incredible. It's like all you senses are sharpened, multiplied to a dozen times normal, every sound, every movement, every smell. And then there's the pride."

"Of what, killing?"

"No, of being a part of something bigger. But I guess you wouldn't understand that."

0934 hrs.Undisclosed Date +3

Streets of Tokyo-3

Lampright stepped into the van.

"So how long do you think we'll be pullin' guard duty?" Smith asked.

"Dunno. They said until NERV's done investigating security's foul-up." Howard replied.

"Yeah, it could be months, the way these Hardy Boys rip-offs work." Lampright said as he stepped inside the van.

1603 hrs.Undisclosed Date +3

Streets of Tokyo-3

Lampright follows at a distance of about twenty yards, making sure to maintain visual contact. The kids took a short cut down an alley, Lampright noticed several threatening hooligans.

"Possible altercation ahead. Moving to intercept." Lampright said into his mic as he accelerated his pace and caught up with the kids.

"Whaddaya mean you ain't got no money?" the biggest one asked and cracked his knuckles.

"Who the fucka you?" one of the other thugs asked as Lampright stumbled through the scene.

"Oh, uh, hey man, I don't want any trouble." Lampright said raising his hands.

"Forget these kids, dude. Let's wail on this bitch!" yelled a third punk.

"Run!" Lampright yells and points towards the street where the van.

Asuka, Rei, and Shinji flee towards it.

"So it's a fight you want, huh!" Lampright yells as he enters a loose fighting stance.

"Let's see how you like it when the prey fights back! Who's first?"

"Yo Tank, take this foo down!" the leader says, as a large man moves towards Lampright.

Lampright just smiles savagely, the kind of smile that freezes ponds. The punk, who's style was obviously force over finesse, threw a hard right jab at Lampright's face. But Lampright wasn't there. He had sidestepped to the left, and threw a knife-hand to Tank's throat, dropping him to his knees coughing.

" Yo, Shadow! Sideshow! Slice this punk! Show'im how we ROLL!"

Another two hooligans stepped forward, and pulled out long daggers.

The first ran at him, while the second circled around. As soon as the first was within range, Lampright trapped and broke his wrist before flipping him to the ground. The second hoodlum was almost on top of Lampright. He rushed the punk, hitting him on the shoulder opposite the arm with the knife and pinned him against a wall. Lampright grabbed his knife hand, pinned it to the wall with one arm, then repetitively hit his wrist with palm-heel strikes until he could no longer hold the knife. Lampright let the punk fall into a heap. Lampright turned around and saw that several more gangers had appeared, and everyone was holding some kind of weapon.

"We gonna fuck you up, asshole!" the leader yelled motioning at his assembled delinquents.

Lampright casually moves aside his coat and with a deliberate lack of speed, drew his pistol from it's armpit holster and flicked off the safety. He looked up at the gang, all of their confidence now gone in the face of firepower.

"Not so fun when the other guy has the unfair advantage, is it?" Lampright asked.

Rapid footsteps sounded at both ends of the alley. Lampright looked past the gang members and saw Sonoda's element moving up from behind them. He didn't have to look to know that the command element was behind him, he heard them cocking their UZIs. Lampright motioned to the soldiers that had surrounded them.

"Meet MY gang."

"Mimura! You fuckin' moron! They're fuckin' Yakuza! What the hell is wrong with you!" one of the gangers yelled as Sonoda's men started to hog-tie the gangers with riot cuffs.

"Hey Howard, they look hot. Help'em out." Lampright said as he watched the scene play itself out.

"Ok." Howard said as he went around and pulled down the pants of all the gangers who were unable to rectify their situation due to having their wrists and ankles cuffed together.

"You better HOPE I never see your sorry asses on the street again. You bitches go get a decent job, join the JSDF or something. And stop hustlin' little kids, you pussies." Sonoda yelled.

When they were finished, Lampright addressed the gangers lying on the ground.

"Now, y'all be good little boys and wait for the cops to arrive. I got a sniper on a rooftop here somewhere, and if you move before the cops get here, he'll put one in your fuckin' head." Lampright said as the troops moved back to their positions.

As he began walking again with the pilots, Denisovich came over the radio.

"Sir, you do realize that Jaeger's not going to stay and watch them, da?"

"Oh I know, but they don't." Lampright replied.

"Hahaha, da, I understand."

Sonoda and Carey's team loaded back up in their vehicles along with the command element, leaving Lampright to again walk with the kids.

"So," Lampright asked "did you three have a good day at school?"


	10. Game of Catch

0615 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Geofront Internal Cavern, Perimeter of NERV Headquarters

The thirteen members of N-FOG, plus two members of NERV security, are running laps around the NERV facility at MOPP-4, their chanted jodie distorted by the voice emitter on the mask, while they ran. Lampright stopped them at the HQ entrance after they complete their fifth mile.

"Dismissed." Lampright barked.

The two security personnel fell to their knees and removed their masks, gasping for air.

"See, that wasn't so bad, was it?" he asked the two as he removed his own mask and stripped out of his suit, turning it inside out.

The two men were still lying on the ground panting, and one had vomited.

The thirteen members of N-FOG walked past the two security personnel and loaded into the elevator.

"Make sure you hose that off." Carey added as he walked past, pointing at the puddle.

The elevator started it's journey down.

"Watching them try to keep up was like watchin' a monkey fuck a basketball." Maloy said with a grin.

"You got fifteen mikes to set your gear to dry and meet in the mess at 0700, hu-ah?" Lampright said.

The message was met with a chorus of affirmatives.

0708 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Cafeteria, NERV Headquarters

"Can't believe they don't have Spam and eggs." Cooper said.

"Yeah, they don't serve corn beef hash either." Lampright added.

"Uh-oh Lampright. Guess who just walked on, and they don't look happy." Larson said.

"Shit." Lampright said as he unobtrusively turned around and proved his suspicions.

"Captain Lampright! What the HELL did you do to Koriyama and Ogami?!"

"Nothin' I didn't do to my own troops, captain." Lampright said casually, taking a drink of his juice.

"Why the hell did you do that to them?! Was that the ONLY thing you could come up with to do for PT?!"

"Meh. We tried football once, but too many people got hurt. We get a little competitive."

"I will not stand for the mistreatment of security personnel."

"Look, I've had this scheduled for weeks. I'll send you my PT schedule."

"Really? I'd LIKE to see THAT. Fine." she said as she turned around and left.

"Hey Howard, if I would be to make a document now, could you make it look like it was, oh, say, three weeks old?"

"Sure."

"Alright. Good."

"Koriyama and Ogami?! Since when do they have names?!" Larson asked.

"Plenty of people name their pets." Howard said with a grin.

2109 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Cpt. Lampright's Quarters, NERV Headquarters

Lampright entered his room and sat down, contemplating inducing vomiting in the wake of Katsuragi's cooking, when there's a knock on his door.

"Come in!" he yelled.

"Wuzzup Shinji?" he said as the pilot walked in.

"Uh, hi."

"Whaddaya need?"

"Uh, you've had a girlfriend before, right captain?"

"Yeah, why? And out of uniform, call me Eric."

"Uh, ok. Well, you see...there's this girl and-"

"A girl? I knew it! I kept tellin' Maloy you weren't gay. Continue."

"Uh, thanks. I think. Anyway, there's this girl, and I-uh my friend likes her, but she just yells at him and hits him and says he's an idiot all the time."

"Has this girl ever indicated that she liked you-I mean 'your friend'?"

"He doesn't know. Sometimes he thinks she gives him a special smile when she thinks no one's looking. But I-my friend doesn't know what to do."

"And I'm guessing asking her is out of the question for some reason, correct?"

"Uh, does that really work?"

"Sometimes. Then again, 'your friend' could just continue to believe she hates him and be miserable."

"When you put it like that....."

"Hey man, I'm not gonna tell you what to do. You gotta make the decision for yourself. I mean, I'll give you info and stuff, but you gotta make the decision for yourself. Alright?"

"Uh, yeah." Shinji said.

"Cool. Anything else?"

Shinji shook his head no.

"Glad to help." Lampright said as he got up and walked the 14 year-old to the door.

Cooper's leaning against the wall as Lampright opens the door to let Shinji out. Lampright waits until Shinji's in his room before turning to Cooper.

"Yes?"

"I saw him enter, so I thought I'd wait. What was that all about?"

"He wanted girl advice."

"So he came to you?!"

"Yeah, I'm surprised too."

"You didn't give him any advice, did you? You could get him killed!"

"Go to bed."

"Is that an order?"

"It could be." Lampright responded.

Cooper smirked.

"Alright, alright."

1423 hrs.Undisclosed Date 1

N-FOG Offices, NERV Headquarters

The now familiar sound of klaxons filled the office just as they had sat down for a meal. The thirteen soldiers ran for the armoury at full-speed while Lampright called for information over the radio.

"Lampright to Major Katsuragi, situation?"

"Another Angel has appeared. Prepare your troops for recovery and report to the command center."

"Roger that."

Lampright turned and spoke to his men.

"Draw weapons and prepare for recovery. Denisovich, draw my weapon and Howard, do your little splicing trick again."

1425 hrs.Undisclosed Date 1

Command Center, NERV Headquarters

"Situation?" Lampright asked.

"The Angel has detached three pieces of itself, and is using it's AT offensively."

"AT fields?"

"Look." Katsuragi said, punching up the view from ObSat-6, revealing three very large craters."

"So it's.....bombing us?"

"In a manner." Dr. Akagi said.

"Looks like it's zeroing in. How long 'til it's next attack?"

"It's in a 119 minute orbit, so less than two hours. Any ideas?"

"Heh. Unless you got the world's largest catcher's mitt, no."

Major Katsuragi's eyes light-up.

"Wow. I don't want any part of THIS. Goodbye. I have a recovery to organize. Hopefully."

1621 hrs.Undisclosed Date 1

N-FOG Office, NERV Headquarters

"What's the situation, cap'n?" Cooper asked.

"We're playin' catch with a very big bomb." he said casually.

"Oh, alright."

"Howard, you get that hook-up yet?"

"Man, I been done with that for like, thirty minutes. We were waitin' on you."

"Then fuckin' turn it on!"

"Alright, alright. Calm down."

"Hey! It's starting!" Herford yelled.

"So this angel is......" Jackson said.

"It's a big bomb. It's gonna fall right on us. So they're gonna try to catch it."

"Try to catch a bomb?"

"Yep."

Jackson shrugged.

"Sounds good to me." he said.

"They really think this'll work?" Herford said.

"That's what I said." Lampright responded as he pulled up a chair and took a seat.

All the soldier's turn their attention to the screen. All three Evas are positioned to cover the estimated impact area. Lampright looks at his watch.

"Operation should begin............now." he said.

Evas 01 and 02 took off, Shinji's Eva still crouched at it's start point.

"What's Ikari's malfunction?! Get moving!" Howard yelled.

Several seconds passed before he moved. The Evas ran at full speed, Eva 00 caught the Angel, straining to hold it. The other Evas arrived and helped him support it. Suddenly the Angel detonated in a huge ball of fire.

"Wow. That was a BIG explosion." Howard said.

"That was uhh....that was kinda close." Sonoda said.

"Yeah, yeah it was. So what now?" Cooper asked.

"I say we get some food." Lampright said.

"Works for me." Montgomery said.

1719 hrs. Undisclosed Date 1

N-FOG Offices, NERV Headquarters

"So, I heard Katsuragi's a MAJOR now." Maloy said.

"And.....?" Lampright said as he took a bite of a rice cake.

"And.....that means that now she's your superior in position AND rank." Cooper said with a grin.

"That may be, but we all know who doesn't sleep when shit needs to be done, hu-ah?" Lampright said with a smirk.

"Hu-ah." the others responded.

The room suddenly becomes pitch black.

"This had better not be a bloody drill." Howard said.

"Don't you ever pay attention during the disaster drills? The emergency lighting would be on. Something's up. Everybody grab an NOD, then report to your alert station."

The sound of thirteen men fumbling in pitch darkness, tripping, cursing, et cetra filled the dark room. They all quickly manage to find the cabinet and get their night vision gear and head to their alert stations while Lampright tried continuously to raise someone on the radio.

"I can't believe internal comms is down to. This is bad." he muttered to himself as he flicked the safety off his pistol while he worked his way to the command center. Lampright counted his paces as he recalled from memory the distances and turns on the way to the command center, reaching it after several long minutes in the pitch darkness before reaching the command center.

"Situation?" Lampright asked from the darkness, startling Dr. Akagi.

"Please refrain from doing that, Captain."

"Situation?"

Dr. Akagi sighed.

Primary, auxiliary, and reserve power went down simultaneously."

"Alright. My men are moving to secure the perimeter. We'll at least have warning of a breach. Where's Major Katsuragi and pilots Ikari and Soryu?"

"Katsuragi hasn't reported in yet, and Ikari and Soryu went to look for him."

"Great. So you let them go in the dark?"

"I don't have time to control them, I need to restart our systems! Besides, they took a flashlight!"

"At least that'll make'em easier to find." Lampright said as he turned around.

"And where are you going?! Due to the Major's absence, you're the ranking officer in here!"

"This is neither my chain-of-command, nor my field of expertise. I'm sure you can manage without a grunt getting in the way." Lampright said as he walked into the darkness.

'Typical. They only want my kind around when they need something.'

1848 hrs.Undisclosed Date 1

Somewhere in NERV Headquarters

'I covered from the command center to their quarters and back again. I've just been wandering for the last hour or so. With no result. Fuckin' great.' Lampright thought as he walked aimlessly through the halls, having lost his sense of direction almost twenty minutes ago.

Suddenly his NOD went white and cut off, the lights had turned on, allowing Lampright to finally know exactly where in the facility he was as he pulled them off his face.

'Well, at least the pilots ought to be able to find their way to the command center. Hopefully the major will too.'

Lampright began making his way back to the command center.


	11. Major Problems

1936 hrs. Undisclosed Date

Mess Hall, NERV Headquarters

The thirteen men of N-FOG are sitting and eating dinner, joking and ribbing each other about the results of the day's training, when the room is suddenly shaded crimson and filled with the noise of klaxons.

"Security breach! Security breach!" a panicked voice comes over the loud-speaker.

Pistols seemed to fly out of holsters as the thirteen men jumped up from their seats, running to their predetermined points through-out NERV headquarters, leaving half-eaten meals in their wake. As he ran to the command center, Lampright began talking into his radio.

"Situation report. Where's the breach and how deep have they penetrated?" he asked calmly.

"They breached at the car port! The-they don't-haven't penetrated any deeper than that into the facility, I think." some techie replied.

"Denisovich! Herford! What's your situation?"

"We are moving through the area now."

"Roger that. Keep me updated." Lampright replied as he headed to the car park instead of the command center, arriving there in less than a minute. Just as he enters the garage, gunfire, some of it automatic, begins up ahead.

"Targets are engaged!" Denisovich yelled over the radio.

He spotted the two soldiers crouched down behind a car and trading fire with several men in face masks with submachine guns spraying on auto from behind a van. Lampright ran in a crouch to their position, diving the last six feet.

"Whadda we got?"

"Four men, with bison SMGs. We surprised them while they were picking through that red sports car. There's a fifth guy, but he's dead. We are a little outgunned, da?" Denisovich said as bullets peppered the car.

"Where's the dead tango?" Lampright said, a plan forming in his mind.

"About two cars up from us." Herford said as he slapped a new magazine into his high-power.

"Right. Cover me on three..." Lampright said as he moved to the edge of the vehicle.

The vehicle dipped slightly as one of the tires was hit and deflated with a hiss.

"Three!" Lampright yelled and made a mad dash, bullets flying through the air around him. He dove down next to the body and grabbed his SMG. He quickly unfolded the skeletal stock and put it to his shoulder.

'This is gonna suck if I've only got like five rounds.' he thought.

"Cease fire!" he yelled and jumped up, spraying the tangos with fire, all of them dropping to the ground. Denisovich and Herford stormed their position, subduing the only survivor and grabbing SMGs for their own use.

"Secure the entrance." Lampright said.

"Roger." Herford said

"Where the hell is security?!" Lampright yelled into his mic.

"They should be onsite in less than a minute." came the reply.

"And send an intel team and a medical team."

The sound of boots sounded from a nearby hallway, and seconds later a team of four NERV guards appears.

"Late, as usual." Lampright said, sitting on the wounded terrorist.

Lampright turns to N-FOG's frequency.

"All units, upon dismissal, you are to report to the armoury for primary weapon, grenade and ammunition draw. You will then report to your quarters and grab all of your combat gear. You will be on combat alert until further notice."

2023 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Mess Hall, NERV Headquarters

The thirteen members of N-FOG are again sitting at a table, though this time they are carrying much heavier weaponry as they eat.

"So what happened?" Larson asked, shifting his M-240 resting between his legs to lean against his left knee.

"A buncha tangos broke into the parking area when a car drove in." Lampright responded.

"What' they want?" Carey questioned.

"Don't know. NERV's gonna get back to us on that one."

"You think they'll take our security analysis more seriously now?" Cooper asked.

"Maybe, but-"

"Captain Lampright, report to the briefing room, immediately."

"Well, I think we'll have answers soon." Lampright said as he stood up, grabbed his rifle, and walked to the door.

He double-timed it to the briefing room, the entire time brooding on the fact that this all could have been prevented if the steps N-FOG had suggested months ago had been implemented. The room was being watched by a NERV guard with an Uzi who stopped Lampright as he tried to enter.

"I'm sorry sir, you can't bring those weapons in there."

"Get out of my way. I have neither the need, nor the inclination to surrender my weapons to you."

"I can't let you past with-"

Lampright cut him off by pushing his out of the way and entering the briefing room.

"What's the situation, Commander Ikari?"

"As you know, NERV security was compromised earlier today."

"Hu-ah sir."

"During that security breach, the terrorists abducted a NERV member and escaped."

"Who'd they get and where are they?"

"They abducted Major Misato Katsuragi, and their current location is unknown."

"So you lost'em?"

"Yes captain."

"I want access to your security footage from the garage, an update report from intel every two hours, and full access to the prisoner."

"Alright. You have my permission to gain information through any means necessary."

"Sir, that-."

"Any means. She must be taken care of. If charges would be to be pressed, I will accept full responsibility for your methods of interrogation. Carry on."

"Yes sir." Lampright said and turned around.

"And captain..."

"Sir?"

"Major Katsuragi has had access to a great deal of classified information. If you can't get her back, make sure no one else can gain access to that knowledge."

Lampright takes a deep breath and releases it.

"Yes sir."

2056 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Briefing Room, NERV Headquarters

The briefing room has been stripped down to a table and two chairs. The surviving enemy is currently sitting cuffed in one. Lampright enters the room, and begins walking around the table, stopping next to the terrorist.

"That's a nasty gunshot you got there." Lampright said, sticking his index and middle finger into the hole in his arm and twisting them..

"You sure you don't want some anesthetic?"

The prisoner spit on him.

Lampright grabbed his left index and middle finger and bent them back until they were parallel to the top of his hand.

"Who sent you?"

"Burn in hell."

Lampright gave a palm-heel strike to the prisoner's nose, landing it with a crack. Blood went everywhere.

"Who sent you?"

"I won't talk!"

Lampright did a half-power knife-hand strike to his throat. The captive spent several minutes gagging and coughing.

"Who sent you?"

"Hrggg! Go suck a dick!"

"I can see this is getting us no where. I'm gonna let you work with my partner for a while."

"Heh. I know how this works. The old good cop, bad cop routine. Now your friend's going to come in, try to be my friend, and get me to talk."

"You're half right. We are playing good cop, bad cop. But I WAS the good cop. I asked questions."

Lampright put his radio to his mouth.

"Denisovich."

The large Russian entered the room just as Lampright exited and closed the door behind him.

0158 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

Briefing Room, NERV Headquarters

The room has been reassembled to it's former configuration, except for a few spots of blood on the walls, ceiling and floor. The twelve remaining soldiers file into the room and form up before Lampright.

"We have possible information of the location of the Major."

This grabs the attention of all twelve of the soldiers.

"Due to the source of the information, I can not be sure of whether or not it's legit. All aerial recon assets are busy and we can't get a satellite overhead for at least 25 hours. So I want a volunteer to go and recon it. This could be a trap, and if it is, you'll be on your own, but at the same time, we NEED information on what we're up against. You will be out there for at least 24 hours alone, gathering and transmitting intel. When the rest of the unit infils to assault, you will still be excepted to fulfill your tactical duties. Any volunteers, please step forward."

All twelve of the troops took a step forward. Lampright smiled inwardly with pride at the dedication of these men. HIS men.

"Jaeger, you're up. Sorry guys. He's best trained for this."

Jaeger turned around and flashed a smile.

"You heard the cap'n."

2103 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

NERV Airstrip, Classified Location

Lampright is helping Jaeger put on his parachute over his other gear.

"Whatcha bringin' for scopes?" Lampright asked.

"The full load. 3x and 10x optical, thermal, and starlight. Why?"

"Just curious. Look, your one of the best your country has, so I'm sure you know what info I want, but just so there's no questions, here's what I want. Number, type, and construction of buildings, readiness status, number of tangos, and most important, if Major Katsuragi is there."

"Roger that, sir."

"One more thing Jaeger." Lampright said as he handed Jaeger a shock-proof case about the size of a .50 ammunition box.

Jaeger took it and packed it into the ruck hanging at his knees before looking at the captain with an expecting expression.

"We call it a laser reader. You aim it at a window and it measures the microscopic vibrations in the glass caused by sound waves and converts them back to sound. You can clear a conversation in a room a klick away clear as if you were there with this thing. It's got a headset as well as an encrypted burst transmitter attached. We'll hear what you'll hear."

"This'll come in handy." Jaeger said with a smile before his facial expression turned to one of suspect.

"Where'd you get this?"

"I got someone in NERV intel who owes me a couple of favors. 'Said nobody'd miss it for a couple of days. So you ready?" Lampright said as he did a walk-around inspection of Jaeger's rig.

"Yeah. I'll find'er, sir."

"I know you won't disappoint me. Now unless I'm mistaken, you've got a plane to catch."

2314 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

Aboard C-130, 45,000 feet above Japan

The wind from the open rear door of the airplane tugged at Jaeger's clothes as he stood in the doorway. His own breathing sounded louder than usual, seemingly magnified by the oxygen mask he was wearing. The small red light on the wall, the only source of illumination in the blacked-out aircraft, cast a sickly glow over the nearby wall and bench seat. Suddenly the light changed from red to green, and Jaeger moved as fast as he could manage down the ramp, taking a flying leap off the end into the dark night.

Briefing Room, NERV Headquarters

The twelve soldiers line the wall of the room, when Lampright speaks up.

"Alright, Jaeger should be hittin' the ground soon. We need to maintain a high level of readiness until we execute. Elements will take eight hour shifts, two on, one off. Decide amongst yourselves the order, just figure it out and stick to it. Sonoda, Carey, Denisovich and me will take six hour turns, three on, one off. First off will be Sonoda, then myself, then Denisovich, then Carey. Understood?"

The troops voiced their understanding.

0754 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

N-FOG Offices, NERV Headquarters

Lampright is sleeping on the floor against a wall, wrapped in a poncho.

"Wake up Lampy." Cooper said, nudging him with his foot.

"This had better be good." Lampright said without opening his eyes.

"Oh it is. We've got Jaeger's recon report."

Lampright quickly gets up.

"Lay it on me."

"According to Jaeger, the compound is one building, four stories; concrete with windows. He reported an unusual level of activity. About a dozen plus change coming and going, plus sentries. They got personal communications, AK-74s, and at least one RPK-74. His current estimate for number of hostiles is 20-30."

"All that's great, but is the mark there?"

"Jaeger said he saw someone who could have been the major in a third story window, but he couldn't get a good look before it was gone. He said he was deploying your 'gift'."

"Lampright sighed and ran his fingers through his hair.

"These boys'll follow you into the gates of hell, all you gotta do is say the word, man."

"I know. But I can't put them in danger if the objective's not there. I won't do it."

"So what's the plan?"

"We wait until the 24-hour mark. What ever information we get will be factored into my decision."

"But...?"

"As of now, we are a no-go."

"But if she's-"

"But nothing. MY men do not get put in harm's way unless we are sure the objective is there. If Commander Ikari gives orders to the contrary, then that changes things, but unless that happens...we don't move unless there's a visual on the objective." Lampright said as he return to his slumber in his make-shift bed.

0856 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

Cooper nudged Lampright's sleeping form awake.

"Come on man, wakey-wakey."

"You know it takes a lot of balls to wake up an officer twice in the same morning?" Lampright said.

"Come on man, get up. The laser reader just picked up a female voice. We think it might be her."

"I need a recording of-"

"Done." Cooper said as he handed him a disc.

Lampright took the disc and headed for the NERV command center.

0901 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

Command Center, NERV Headquarters

"Did you get lost Captain?" Commander Ikari asked as he entered the room.

'Now is NOT the time, Ikari.' he thought.

"I need a voice analysis on this disc to see if it's Major Katsuragi."

"That's a great idea. If we had a sample to compare it to." Dr. Akagi said.

Lampright slammed his fist into a concrete pillar in frustration before stopping and thinking for a minute.

"Somebody gimme their cell phone." he said as he looked around the control room staff, receiving blank looks.

"Come on, I know somebody here's got a cellular phone. They're all the rage for people your age." he said as he glared again at the staff, most barely out of their teens.

"What do you mean 'our age'?! We're as old as you!" 1LT Ibuki said.

Lampright was beginning to get sick of NERV personnel.

"You'd do well to remember that you're speaking to a captain, LIEUTENANT Ibuki. You'd also do well to remember that looks are deceiving, because unless you're thirty, you're hardly 'my age'. Now I'll ask again. Who has a cellular phone?"

Lieutenant Ibuki sheepishly dug into her pocket and handed him a small flip-phone.

"Thank you." Lampright said.

He pulled a small card out of his left breast pocket containing contact information for all the personnel relevant to his position and searched down the card for Major Katsuragi's phone number.

"What is this about, captain?" Dr. Akagi asked Lampright as he dialed a number into the phone.

'For a top researcher, she doesn't catch on very well, does she?'

"This is the number for the Major's voice mail. When you're ready to record a sample, just hit 'send'. I expect to be notified as soon as you have the results." Lampright said as he handed her the phone.

0923 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

N-FOG Offices, NERV Headquarters

"Captain Lampright?" Ibuki's voice came over his radio.

"Lieutenant?"

"We have a positive voice match on your sample for Major Misato Katsuragi."

"Finally, some good news. That is all lieutenant."

Lampright turned to his men.

"We have the mark!" he yelled.

This announcement was meet with cheers from the troops.

"We move today!"

"In daylight?" Sonoda asked.

"Yeah. Every minute's important right now. Besides, if these are the same guys who've been fuckin' with us since day one, and I think they are, they'll think they have our M.O. down. We've never attacked during the day before. They won't completely expect it."

"Roger." Sonoda said.

"Alright, briefing at 1230, PCI at 1300. That is all."

1207 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

Captain Lampright's Quarters, NERV Headquarters

The captain is cleaning his rifle as there is a knock on his door. He loosened his pistol in it's holster as he walked to the door and checked the peephole. He calmed as he saw the slightly distorted face of pilot Rei Ayanami. He took his hand off of his pistol as he opened the door.

"Can I help you?" he asked.

"Captain, it is imperative that Major Katsuragi be recovered unharmed." she said.

"Don't worry. We'll bring'er back."

"It is unnecessary to patronize me, captain."

"Remember when we extracted you? We do this stuff for a living. Don't worry."

"I am aware of your past successes, captain."

"Good. Look, I've got a lot of work to do before we execute, so if you're done telling me my job, I need to get back to my prepping."

1230 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

N-FOG Offices, NERV Headquarters

"Alright, as you know, Jaeger's already in position. He says the woodline's about 25-30 meters from the building. Target's last confirmed location was the third floor, west end, north side. Plan is as follows. Team one will helo out to the woods and be dropped about a klick out. You'll hoof it to the woodline and signal when you're in position. You will then move in and secure the first two floors of the building. At that point, the command element will be inserted into the third floor we will clear the floor and secure the mark. It's gonna be a rappel from the helo, then swing in the windows. Team two will then immediately be dropped on the roof. You will move down and secure the top floor. For evac, the helos will come in for a landing or near touch on the roof. Command and the mark will be out on the first helo, teams one and two on the second. I don't need to remind you all of the dangers of operating during daylight hours. This needs to be hard and fast. Just don't make me look bad, okay?" he said with a half smile.

1352 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

Airborne Helo Near Objective

"Masks go?" Lampright asked.

Everyone in the command element and team two checked their mask seals and gave the thumbs-up.

"Team one, in position." Carey suddenly radioed.

Lampright yelled at the pilot to bring the helo in over the objective.

Within two minutes they were hovering over the building, the helo straddling the side of the building.

"Ropes ropes ropes." Lampright said, giving the hand signal as he tossed the rope out the side of the helo.

Lampright grabbed the rope and positioned himself on the edge of the helo and flashed a thumbs-up.

"Go."

Lampright, Denisovich, Howard and Smith rappelled down the side of the building, each attaching a small charge to their assigned window. The windows shattered, and each of the soldiers threw a cooked-off irritant grenade in the window, swung in, and hit the quick-release on their rope harness. The rooms quickly began to fill with CS gas. The four soldiers quickly spread out, clearing the third floor as Sonoda and Carey's teams cleared the first and fourth floors. Gun shots echoed from the walls of the facility as the soldiers entered the building.

"Drop your weapons and you won't be harmed!" Lampright yelled, his words punctuated by the blast of his shotgun as he fired it at the terrorist charging him, who was unable to shoot straight due to exposure to the gas. Lampright slung his rifle and unholstered his pistol before he kicked in a door and found the mark.

"Friendlies!" Lampright yelled.

Lampright suddenly saw a blur of motion from the side, barely managing to side-step the terrorist's clumsy bull-rush. The terrorist turned around and started to square off with Lampright, attempting to bring his pistol to bare. Lampright just bashed him across the brow with the grip of his pistol, knocking him to the ground. Lampright placed his foot on the man's chest. The man fumbled for his pistol, just out of reach. A red laser dot from Lampright's pistol appeared between his eyes. The pistol barked and kicked twice, the forty-five caliber rounds pulping the man's head. Lampright walked over to the major, who was tearing and hacking up a lung. Lampright's radio suddenly came to life.

"Fourth clear!" Sonoda's voice sounded.

"Come on major, we need to go." he said as he grabbed her under her armpit and pulled her to her feet.

"I cough hack I can-can't uhhgg can't breath." she said between coughs.

"You can breath fine." Lampright said scornfully.

"Third floor clear." Denisovich sounded through the radio.

He quickly made his way up the stairs and out onto the roof, practically dragging Major Katsuragi behind him. The major nearly ran Lampright over trying to get into the fresh air on the roof.

"Oh by the way, don't rub your eyes. It makes it worse."

"First clear." Carey said.

Lampright turned back to the stairway.

"Second clear." Sonoda reported.

"Command element report to rooftop. I am beginning my walk-through. Anything to report?"

A trio of negatives came through the radio as he completed a quick walkthrough of the facility.

"Cooper, I need you to-"

"Done captain. Building's ready to go."

"Roger. Everyone fall back to the roofto-holy shit!"

Suddenly the rooftop was raked with fire.

"Where'd that come from?!"

Three tangos in the woodline! Moving to close with the building!" Cooper yelled over the radio.

Lampright moved towards the edge of the roof. Suddenly, something landed on the roof. Lampright instantly recognized it as the major yelled out it's name.

"Grenade!"

"Down! he yelled as he pushed the major to the ground, throwing himself on top of her to shield her from the blast.

Lampright said a short prayer as he kicked the grenade away. Nothing happened. Lampright looked at the grenade. It was just sitting there, no smoke from the fuse, no burning smell. He jumped up, grabbing the major by the back of her collar, yanking her to her feet.

"Time to go." He said calmly as he ran to the edge of the building. The gunfire had already stopped, three bodies laying near the base of the building.

"You could be a little more gentle, you know." she grumbled.

"Gentle is for foreplay. You're in my world now." He replied gruffly.

"Everybody get up here now. Howard, call in our helos. Let's get the hell outta here."

The troops gathered on the rooftop, taking up positions of overwatch near the edges as the sound of the approaching helicopters grew louder. The helos came in and hovered about a foot above the rooftop.

"GO!" Lampright yelled, practically throwing the major into the helo. The remaining troops quickly piled in, and within seconds they were airborne.

"Hit it Cooper." Lampright said.

Cooper activated the radio detonator, and the entire first two floors of the building exploded, the remaining two collapsing down on top of them in a pile of rubble. Lampright addressed the pilot.

"Home Jeebes." he said.

Smith was wrapping Major Katsuragi in a space blanket to combat shock.

1634 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

Intelligence Office, NERV Headquarters

Lampright watches through the 'magic mirror' while intel attempts to debrief the major. The head intel officer approaches Lampright.

"Yes?" Lampright said.

"We're not getting anything useful from her." he said, shaking his head.

"Roger." Lampright said and sighed.

"DAMNIT! I'm getting sick and tired of being a reactionary force! I want to be on the offense for once!"

"We're working on it captain. We're working on it."


	12. Mysterious Visitors

1824 hrs.Undisclosed Date

CPT Lampright's Quarters

There's a knock on the door.

"Come in." Lampright said from where he was practicing martial arts shirtless in his living room, his dog tags swinging wildly as he moved.

"Umm, I-Shinji was wondering...you eat dinner alone

alot, right?"

"And?"

"And he thought it would be nice if we invited you over for dinner!"

"Uh...ok. Just lemme get dressed and I'll join you." Lampright said, a little suspicious of her motive.

1833 hrs. Undisclosed Date

Cpt. Katsuragi's Quarters, NERV Headquarters

"What's he doing here!" Asuka yelled.

"He's a guest Asuka, behave yourself." Katsuragi said.

Asuka lifted her nose.

"So, did you kill anyone today?"

"Not yet." Lampright growled and leered at her.

"So, what do you think of the Evas?" Katsuragi asked.

Lampright thought back to the first time he ever saw an Eva.

Dr. Akagi slid a picture of Evangelion Unit-00 across the table to Lampright.

"What do you think of this?" she asked.

"What do-what do I think of it? I think I'm going to need a bigger gun."

"Captain, this is a serious matter."

"And I'm being serious. I'll need a bigger gun."

"Captain, do you even know what that is?" she asked irritated.

"Nope. Not a clue."

"Captain, are you trying to tell you you haven't been briefed on any of this?"

"Nope. I arrived here less than an hour ago. Nobody's told me anything."

"I don't have the time for this!" she said as she got up.

"Oh yeah, and I don't have anything better to do!" Lampright said angrily.

"They're alright."

"Alright! Alright! The Evas are the only thing that can defeat the Angels, and you think they're just ALRIGHT!"

"Yeah, pretty much. They have obvious tactical flaws."

"Yeah! Like what!"

"Can you take a building with it? Can you conduct clandestine operations? And then there's the little thing about only a few minutes of battery life."

Katsuragi sighed.

"Great." she said as she got up from the table and moving to the food on the counter.

"Dumkoff. I could squish you with one step!" Asuka yelled.

"Yeah, if you could FIND me!" Lampright growled at her, planting his palms on the table and leaning aggressively over the table.

'Appearently saving her life only made her hate him more. She's so...' Shinji thought as he sighed.

"Alright, let's eat!" Misato said, returning to the table with a tray of things vaguely resembling food.

"Chow time." Lampright said as he took a bit of his food which almost made him gag.

'Why do I have a sudden longing for SERE cuisine?' he thought.

"How do you like my cooking?" Katsuragi asked.

"Great." he said trying to decide whether or not she was trying to kill him.

Suddenly he saw movement out of the corner of his eye. He looked over and thought for a second he was hallucinating. He stared at it harder.

"What the...?"

"Oh, that's Pen-Pen. He's a penguin." Asuka said with scorn.

Lampright turned to her, willing her head to explode.

"Thank you, Asuka. I never would have figured that out if not for your incredible intellect." he turned to address the Major.

"Why is there a penguin in your quarters?"

"He's my pet!" Katsuragi said with a smile.

"Makes sense to me."

'Last time I EVER accept an invitation for dinner from a CO.'

Lampright sighed.

"It's gonna be a long night." he muttered.

2209 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Residential Area, NERV Headquarters

"Yeah, we should...do this again...sometime." Lampright said as he walked across the three foot gap between his room and Major Katsuragi's.

"Alright!" she said as he entered his room.

Lampright suddenly remembered some paperwork had forgotten.

"Shit." Lampright said as he grabbed his keys and headed to the office.

As he approached the office, he realized something was amiss. The door was slightly open.

'I KNOW I didn't leave the door open.'

He examined the door as he opened it just wide enough for him to slip in.

'It's been picked. Great.'

As he entered, he saw a beam of light from a small flashlight. Lampright crept up on the figure, who was busy searching through the group's records, the flashlight held in his mouth. Lampright came up behind him and grabbed him in a choke hold, his elbow pressing hard into his neck until the figure passed out. Lampright grabbed a set of flex-cuffs from his desk and used them before turning on the lights.

"Mr. Kaji."

Lampright reached for his phone.

"Yeah, security. This is Captain Lampright. Yeah, yeah. I need a security team to the N-FOG office. Someone broke in and was sneaking around, lookin' through our files. Yeah, yeah, he's riot cuffed right now, and I'm watchin' 'im, just uh, hurry up. Roger."

"You picked the wrong guys to fuck with." he said to Kaji's unconscious form.

0812 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

Cafeteria, NERV Headquarters

The thirteen soldiers are sitting at a table, eating their breakfasts.

"Why did you do that Mr. Kaji!" Asuka screamed at Lampright, suddenly appearing from nowhere.

"I dunno. Why did he break into my office?"

"You arrested Kaji!"

"No, actually security arrested Kaji. I just tied him up."

"Why you-"

"Don't care." Lampright said.

"I can't believe you had him arrested!"

"I can't believe I'm still having this conversation. Bye." Lampright said as he commenced completely ignoring Asuka.

Asuka continued to yell at the soldiers, just as Major Katsuragi walked in.

'Oh, thank God!'

"Captain Lampright, we need to talk. Now!"

The other twelve looked at him. Lampright stood-up, shrugged, and walked out with the major.

"Captain, what's this about you arresting Mr. Kaji?"

"You see, there seems to be a misconception about that. I didn't arrest him. Security did."

"Lampright, you have thirty seconds to explain yourself."

"He broke into MY office and was rifling through MY stuff, and I have to explain why I had him arrested! What's wrong with this picture!" he said, becoming more than slightly irrate.

"Look, let me explain something to you, since you obviously don't know. Mr. Kaji is very well connected. He's even got the ear of Commander Ikari for some reason. You can't just go arresting him."

"Well, I did. This conversation is finished." Lampright said, storming off.

He headed for his office. Kaji came around a corner just as Lampright passed. Lampright turned and grabbed him by the collar, forcing him against the wall.

"Whoa! Calm down!"

Lampright lifted him several inches off the ground.

"Let's get a few things straight, pretty boy. I don't care who you are, who you've paid off, or who your friends are. If I ever so much as SEE you near my office again, I'll shoot you myself." Lampright said, without an ounce of exageration or falsehood. He heard footsteps coming around the corner, so he set Kaji back on the ground.

"What are you doing to Mr. Kaji!" Asuka yelled.

"We were just having a 'discussion' about where Mr. Kaji can and can't go, weren't we, civilian?"

"Yeah. Nothin' to worry about Asuka." Kaji said, throwing on his best smile.

0834 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

Major Katsuragi's Office, NERV Headquarters

"Hey, beautiful." Kaji said, strolling in with several papers under his arm.

"Kaji, I am REALLY busy-"

"I have some information you might want on everyone's favorite captain."

"Kaji! You are in ALOT of trouble right now for that crap! I'm pretty sure Lampright's about to beat the living hell out of you too. This is the last thing you need to be doing. Go TRY to make yourself or something."

"Suit yourself, babe." he said, throwing the documents down on her desk and leaving.

Major Katsuragi continued her work. She picked up the file folder, her curiosity nearly getting the better of her, but she threw the folder in the shredder at the last moment.

1606 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

N-FOG Office, NERV Headquarters

"Hey guys!" Lampright yelled, grabbing the attention of the other twelve soldiers who were cleaning weapons.

"What!" Cooper yelled.

"NERV doubled their security for the evening and night! We're goin' out!"

"Woohoo! Lock your doors and hide your daughters!" Maloy yelled.

"Hey, you know they're showin' that new movie about the battle for Taiwan at 1730. Who's in?" Cooper asked.

"I'm game. I wanna see how bad they fucked it up." Lampright said.

"Heh-heh, yeah. Let's do it." Maloy said.

"Me too." Howard said.

"Well, who ever's goin', meet at the bottom of the main surface elevator at 1645." Cooper said.

"Cool. I'm gonna go change." Lampright said.

1638 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

Residential Area, NERV Headquarters

Major Katsuragi carried her groceries down the hall. She fumbled for her keys, accidentially cracking a bottle of red wine against the door. As she unlocked the door, the wine began to seep through the bag.

"Shit!" she said, as the wine began to stain her shirt and drip to the ground, leaving dark stains on the carpet. She pushed open the door and let it slam behind her, failing to close all the way. She practically threw the groceries down on the table, knocking several miscellanious objects to the ground. She threw her shirt in the washing machine

and began to take a shower.

1640 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

CPT Lampright's Quarters, NERV Headquarters

Lampright stuffed an extra pistol mag into his pocket as he left the room, careful to lock the door behind himself. As he turned to leave, he noticed the dark stains on the carpet.

'That looks like-'

Lampright went to knock on the door, and realized it was open.

'Shit.'

Lampright drew his pistol and snuck into the room.

"Major?" he said quietly, as he noticed the items knocked off the table, assuming a struggle. He decided to check the bedroom and turned down the hallway. Lampright came around the corner and was face-to-face with Maj. Katsuragi in a towel. Less than four inches seperated them.

"Lampright?"

Lampright swallowed and blushed.

"Uh, I apologize ma'am. I...uh..."

They just stared each other in the eyes for almost a minute. Misato leaned forward and kissed Lampright on the lips. Lampright gave in at first, then suddenly pushed her off of him.

"No, no, no. This isn't right. You're my-my CO. I-I can't-" he stuttered as he turned even brighter red.

"Shut-up." she said as she pulled his head forward, causing their lips to meet again.

Lampright's head swam as the blood stopped flowing to his brain.

"I-uh-"

"You wanted it, I can tell." she said, pressing her damp chest against him and whispering in his ear.

1645 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

Surface Elevator, NERV Headquarters

"Where the fuck is Lampright?" Cooper asked irritated.

"Who knows. We're gonna miss the movie though. I say we leave'im." Maloy said.

"Yeah, I agree. Fuck'im." Howard said as he push the button and the elevator began it's ascent.

"He doesn't have a clue how much of a good time he just missed." Cooper muttered.

2026 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

MAJ Katsuragi's Quarters, NERV Headquarters

Lampright surveyed his situation and took stock of his options. If somehow he could manage the unlikely act of breaking contact with the sleeping major, whose arms were wrapped around his bare chest, as well as the arm of his she was laying on, that still might not be the best course of action.

'I'm not suring running out on her would simplify the situation. It's not like she doesn't know where to find me. Nope, stay the course.'

"Misato! I'm home!" Shinji said from the door, waking the major.

The two officers looked at each other, eyes wide.

"Shit." they both said in unison.

Lampright grabbed his clothes and hid flush against the wall.

'Escape!' Lampright thought as he quickly got dressed.

"I don't want Shinji to know about this." the Major said as she quickly dressed and went out.

He could hear her making nervous small talk with Shinji.

'Not a good actress.' he thought as he scanned the room for an escape route.

'The window!'

Lampright silently crossed the room and checked it.

'Shit it's like, a hundred feet down. Fuck that.'

He suddenly had another idea. He moved to her mirror and fixed his clothes before displaying his best 'stop wasting my time attitude' and opened the door.

"I told you Major, there's no way anyone's coming in through that window. I think you've wasted enough of my time on what was SUPPOSED to be my day off!" he said angrily as he left, slamming the door behind him.

2248 hrs. Undisclosed Date +1

Tokyo-3

The three soldiers are walking down the street.

"What you doing tonight, G.I.?" a hooker asked.

"Not you." Cooper said pointing at her with both index fingers as he continued to walk past her.

"There a problem with her?" a punk pimp-wannabe asked, stepping from the shadows.

"Was I NOT clear?" Cooper asked.

Several other thugs came into sight. Cooper looked at the other two and grinned, sucker-punching the pimp in the stomach then lighting him up with a wicked upper-cut.

Maloy kicked the closest one in the groin. Howard grabbed the one nearest to him by the collar, slammed him against the brick wall, and proceeded to beat his head against it.

"This is better than the movie!" Cooper yelled breaking another thug's nose.

"Ain't it!" Maloy responded, inverting the punk he was holding and dropping him into a metal trashcan, which he then kicked as hard as he could, leaving a large dent in the side.

"I love a good melee!" Howard yelled, catching a kick and snapping the assailant's ankle, then pulling him forward and head-butting him across his brow, blood flowing freely.

The thugs kept coming like ants. The three were suddenly back-to-back, fists up, surrounded by about a dozen.

"Playtime's over. DRAW!" Cooper yelled.

The three drew their pistols, and the thugs scattered.

"That was AWESOME!" Howard yelled, high-fiving Cooper.

Sirens suddenly sounded as a police car turned the corner.

"Shit! It's the bacon!" Maloy yelled.

"Scatter!" Cooper yelled.

The three each ran in a random direction.

2254 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

CPT Lampright's Quarters, NERV Headquarters

"Lampright, we just got a report that three guys beat-up a dozen other people near one of our elevators, the police thought we should know. Could you go and check out the eastern service elevator." Major Katsuragi said over the radio.

Lampright sighed

"No need, I know exactly who administered the beating."

"Don't tell me-"

"Yeah, three of my left through that elevator and should be returning about now."

"Dammit Lampright! I can't have your-"

"Don't worry, I'll take care of it."

2326 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

Residential Area, NERV Headquarters

Cooper is sneaking down the hallway, lightly knocking on a door.

"Maloy? Maloy, you there?"

There's two knocks from the other side.

"You got Howard?"

Another two knocks.

"Sweet." Cooper said.

Now that everyone was accounted for, he could go to sleep.

0812 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

Cafeteria, NERV Headquarters

"Where the fuck were you yesterday? The Major find some extra work for you to do?" Cooper asked.

"Yeah, something like that. So how was the movie?"

"You know a war movie's never as good when you were there."

"True, true. But it still sounds like you guys had fun last night."

"Why would you say that?"

"Police sent a warning that three people had beat the living shit out of about a dozen petty thugs. It was near one of our surface elevators, so they informed us."

"It was awesome dude! You shoulda been there! It was-wait a minute, does the Major know it was us?"

"Yes." Lampright said, taking a sip of his orange juice.

"Is she pissed?"

"The major and I came to an understanding."


	13. Unconventional Warfare

0823 hrs

0823 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Cafeteria, NERV Headquarters

"Hey, pass the salt." Howard asked a NERV techie several seats down from him.

The man grabbed the salt, passing it to him. Howard began shaking the salt on, when the cap fell off, dumping the entire contents of the shaker onto his omelet. Howard starred at his food thoughtfully, then starred at tech, who was laughing his head off. Howard acted jovial about.

"Hey dude, that was good. Come on man, put'ere there." he said extending his hand.

The techie began to shake his hand, only to be hit with a relatively high voltage of electricity for a split second courtesy of his hand buzzer. The other soldiers laughed.

"I don't even WANT to know why he has one of those at work." Lampright muttered.

1238 hrs.Undisclosed Date

N-FOG Office, NERV Headquarters

There was a knock on the door. Lampright answered, a pizza man with over a dozen pizzas standing in front of him.

"Who ordered pizza?!" he shouted back into the room.

No response.

"Nobody ordered."

"Dude, it clearly says fifteen pineapple and anchovy pizzas to be delivered to NERV Headquarters, room 1545. That's you. I need my money dude." the pizza boy said.

What was happening suddenly dawned on him.

"Maloy! Howard! Get over here! I think we have a situation!"

The two ran over.

"Tell them what you just told me."

"I received an order for fifteen pineapple and anchovy pizzas for here."

Maloy and Howard looked at each other. Maloy grinned as Howard shook his head.

"Fuckin' amateurs." Howard said.

"I hope they realize that this means war." Maloy said.

Lampright broke into a grin.

2203 hrs.Undisclosed Date

N-FOG Office, NERV Headquarters

The soldiers are standing with Lampright addressing them.

"Gentlemen, your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to conduct unconventional warfare against the targets. Make no mistake, this is a black op. If you are captured, I will deny all knowledge of your existence. Sergeant Howard will be taking command of this operation, due to his expertise." Lampright told the assembled group.

Howard took Lampright's position.

"I am sure that you are all aware of the slight that has been dealt to us by the enemy. Now we must reply in kind. Allow me to make one thing clear. This is total war. We must meet the enemy with overwhelming force on all fronts simultaneously. Assisting me in this operation is Gunnery Sergeant Maloy."

Maloy waved.

"Command element, your AO is the main male shower room and latrine. You will place dye packets in all of the shower heads, as well as put plastic wrap on all the toilets. First team, you will work in the cafeteria. I want the entire bottle of hot sauce dumped into an entree, as well several random tables booby-trapped with grenade simulators. Second team, you will place that cake, which is happens to be laced with ex-lax, in the control room lounge, as well as prep these stink bombs with remote detonators and place them in the ventilation shafts leading to the main control area. I will be doing some work with various electronic systems around NERV HQ. Maloy will be taking care of their coffee. He will also be rewiring several light switches to cause a wicked shock when activated. You have been assigned your objectives. Be on the look out for targets of opportunity. Any questions? Good. Take your supplies and move out." he said pointing to the table.

The table was covered with materials. Ex-lax, green and blue dye packets, plastic wrap, an empty coffee pot, grenade simulators, string, stink bombs, hot sauce, shoe polish, a very nice looking half-gone cake, dozens of other tools of prankery.

Howard turned to Lampright, snapped to attention and saluted. Lampright returned it.

"I won't fail you sir."

"I know Howard, I know." Lampright said with a smirk.

The various teams took the gear they needed and left the room, creeping through the halls of NERV headquarters.

0012 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

N-FOG Office, NERV Headquarters

The last man finally straggled in. Maloy entered the room, grinning broadly.

"Anyone hit any targets of opportunity?"

"I put shoe polish on the rubber eye piece of several of the retinal scanners." Lampright said.

"I put Icy-Hot on the toilet seats." Jackson replied.

"Way to go! I didn't think you had it in you!" Howard said, slapping him on the back.

"I put pee-see in several of the urinals." Cooper said.

"You guys familiar with derma-bond?" Smith asked.

Everybody starred at him.

"It's great stuff. It only dries once it contacts flesh, and once it does, it's like super-glue. I put it on the palm scanner on the door to R&D." Smith said with a smirk.

"I tied a tampon to the antennae of the NERV field group's commander's car." Maloy said.

"That's MY car." Lampright said.

"I know."

"Maloy, did I ever tell you your mom shoulda swallowed?"

He turned to where Howard was leaning back in his chair, looking very pleased with himself.

"Howard, what exactly did you do?" Lampright asked.

"I arranged a remote activated audio-only copy 'Debbie Does Dallas' to be played over the PA. Then I changed the elevator music to the soundtrack from 'Mary Poppins'. I also crashed the NERV personal internet access server."

"Nice." Lampright responded.

"So what do we do now?" Larson asked.

"Just sit back and enjoy the ride." Lampright said.

0613 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

Hallway, NERV Headquarters

Cooper stops a NERV tech, his skin dyed blue, from entering the elevator.

"I'm sorry, smurfs aren't allowed down there."

"Chief, let me through."

"I said no. Don't make me get Gargamel."

"The last laugh is ours, grunt. Major Katsuragi's on her way to talk to your commander RIGHT now."

"Oh shit."

Cooper pulled out his radio.

"Lampright, the maj is on her way to see you."

N-FOG Offices, NERV Headquarters

"Thanks." Lampright said through the radio, dripping sarcasm, before returning his attention to his superior.

"Captain, how do you justify this-this prank war?!" she yelled.

Lampright shrugged.

"Slow week."

"Slow week?! Someone urinated in the coffee pot!"

"Heh, yeah, that'll happen."

"Your troops are out of control."

"Hey, YOUR boys started it. You shouldn't dish if you can't take."

"Captain, we had to call a paramedic to help a researcher whose hand had been GLUED to a palm scanner pad."

"I'm sorry to hear that."

"Captain, control your men. That's all I'm asking. Please."

"Fine, control yours and there won't be a problem.."

The Major sighed.

"A truce. I'll try to get them to stop."

"Then we will stop."

"Thank you."

'Man, I NEED some chocolate. Wasn't there part of a cake left in the lounge?' she though to herself as she left.

The major turned around and walked out, passing Jaeger who was on his way in.

"Well, it looks like she found one of your retinal scanners." he said after the door closed.

"Yeah, it was really hard not to laugh."


	14. Vessel Under Pressure

2254 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Streets of Tokyo-3

The baker's dozen have again been let out of the box.

"Sooo...she wasn't a hooker?" Maloy said nursing a palm-print on his cheek.

"No Maloy, she wasn't. And she looked pretty pissed too. If she files a report, it's your ass. I REALLY hate having to explain you guys to my CO."

Cooper, bringing up the rear, was still laughing from the incident that had taken place about a minute ago. He saw something out of the corner of his eye and turned to get a better look. He thought he saw a woman with spikey blue-hair, carrying a large bottle of sake, flying through air above him.

"Did anyone else see that?"

"See...what?" Lampright asked.

"Never mind."

'I have GOT to stop drinking shit brewed in bathtubs.'

0221 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

CPT Lampright's Quarters, NERV Headquarters

Lampright is sleeping soundly in his bed as the phone begins to ring. He sits up and swings his feet over the side of the bed. He quickly tried to rub the sleep from his eyes.

"Somebody BETTER be dead." he said as he crossed the room.

"Captain Lampright speaking."

"What?" he said, instantly waking up completely.

"Roger. I'll be there in ten mikes."

He hung up and got on his radio.

"Denisovich, get everybody up and in the office. Yeah, don't worry, it's worth it."

0248 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

N-FOG Office, NERV Headquarters

"I have an announcement that all of you want to hear." Lampright said.

"Howard likes the cock!" Maloy yelled from the back.

"Even better than that." Lampright assured them.

"What's better than me liking the cock!" Howard replied, grinning.

"We're going on the offense." Lampright said, not completely managing to keep a smile off his face.

"SCORE!" Larson yelled, high-fiving Cooper.

"At 0209 this morning, NERV received intelligence indicating that our 'mysterious assailants' are moving equipment by ship through the Sea of Japan. We will board the ship, neutralize the enemy presence, radio the Japanese maritime authorities, and await their arrival. Cooper, you will be assisting me in planning of this operation. Assembly time is 1800 hours, with mission commencing at 2300. Stand-by your radios for updates. Cooper, stand-by, everybody else, dismissed."

0558 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

"I could do it, and I bet the German, the 'operator and the two SAS guys could do it too." Cooper said.

"You sure? I mean, I'm a pretty good paratrooper, but landing on a rockin' ship, that's a challenge."

"Yeah, I've done it before. My concern is what about everyone else?"

"Me and Maloy are gonna bring the rest in on an RIB. That's gonna be fun." Lampright said with a smirk.

"Whadda you know 'bout RIBs?"

"I used'em back in Ranger School in the swamp phase, I've used'em operationally a couple of times too."

"Well then, let's get crackin'. Sir."

"Shut-up."

1800 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

Lampright stood in front of the room, Cooper standing off to his side, a large image of the Lotus Blossom, a small container ship behind him.

"This is our objective. It is reported to be carrying weapons, ammunition, supplies and possibly a few vehicles that are to be turned over to whoever is responsible for providing all of the targets since we arrived. Now, the plan is as follows:

Cooper, Jaeger, Jackson, Monty and Howard will paradrop onto the ship and secure the deck. Now, according to intel, the entire is armed, so it's a free-fire zone. Once the deck is secure, the remainder of us will insert by RIB. We will ascend to the deck by a rope ladder, which will be lowered from the deck by Monty, here." he said as he pointed to a spot on the port side, just forward of the bridge.

"Once aboard, command element will search the connexs on deck, team A will search the living areas, and team B will search the cargo holds. I want it done fast. From boots on deck to ship secure, twenty-five mikes tops. From there, we radio maritime authorities, and then turn the vessel over to them. Now then, due to special considerations based on environment, our standard weapons load-out will be modified. Armament will consist of melee weapons, pistols, SMGs and shotguns, and flash-bangs. Wouldn't wanna blow a hole in the hull now, would we?"

This decision was not well liked by the men.

"Hey, on the upside, I have managed to procure a number of P-90s for our use, complete with suppressors, if that makes any of you feel any better."

2354 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

3,000 ft. above freighter Lotus Blossom

Chief Petty Officer Daniel Cooper carefully steered himself, aiming for the lighted shape of the ship's deck, thousands of feet below. Even though he couldn't see them, he knew that the other four who had jumped out with him were in a close formation with him Suddenly, he was yanked upwards, his chute fully deploying about five hundred feet above the ship. He executed a PLF, landing on top of one of the dozen or so connexs dotting deck of the ship with a hollow, metallic thud. He detached himself from his rig, and readied his weapon, going prone and observing the deck for half a minute before dropping lightly to the deck. Cooper knew he was near the bow, and held position until the rest of the team straggled in one by one, Jackson with the ladder and Monty and Howard splitting a set of breaching tools. Jaeger brought up the rear with a Benelli shotgun as the other four moved out with suppressed P-90s. Cooper turned the corner around a connex, a man with an AK-74 smoking a cigarette, starred at Cooper for a split-second, the cigarette fell from his lips as Cooper fired, splitting him from groin to scalp with a controlled burst, finishing him before the butt even hit the ground. The clattering of the suppressed weapon's bolt seemed louder than a dozen .50 cals in the still night air. Cooper began to drag the two pieces of the body out of sight as Howard passed him.

"Guess it's true what they say." he said.

"What?" Cooper asked.

"Those things'll kill you." he said, pointing to the butt.

Cooper made a shooing motion with his hand as Howard grinned.

Cooper heard another burst of clatters, this one coming from the bridge.

'Damn it! We're falling behind.' he thought.

0003 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

Jackson guarded the top of the ladder in a crouch, as the rest of the group boarded the ship from their black zodiac-like craft.

"Eight down. Deck and bridge are clear, the other four are guarding entry points to the deck, sir." Jackson said, apprising the captain of the situation.

Lampright merely nodded.

"No need for quiet now."

"Permission to go loud." he said into his mic.

The groups spread out and covered down on their assigned tasks. Lampright and the command crew began cutting locks off of connexs and searching their contents, a short burst of automatic fire or the curt roar of a shotgun occasionally puncturing the otherwise quiet night. Lampright photographed all the finds, boxes of AKs, RPGs, explosives, a few PKMs, even a light mortar. And ammunition, thousands and thousands of rounds. Howard was in the bridge playing with the ship's GPS, pulling out all the tracking data to allow them to figure out it's route, and where the supplies came from.

"Sonoda to Lampright, I'm in the hold. You wanna see this." Sonoda's voice came over the radio.

"Inbound." Lampright said, jumping down a hatch.

He quickly made his way to the main hold, meeting with the leader of bravo team.

"What've we got?"

Sonoda pulled aside a tarp.

"Holy shit. Are those what I think they are?" Lampright said.

"Yeah. They look like some kind of modified entry plug. Nine of'em."

"Howard, meet me on the on the deck." Lampright said, snapping pictures from multiple angles.

0010 hrs. Undisclosed Date +2

"Is HQ dialed in?" Lampright asked.

"Rog."

Lampright shoved the handset under his helmet.

"This is Lampright. I need to speak to Commander Ikari. Now."

Several minutes pass.

"Sir, we have Eva components on the ship. Instructions?"

"Roger sir."

Lampright hands the handset back to Howard and switches on his radio.

"Cooper, we're scuttling the ship. Get on it. If you need explosives, I've got some up here."

"Don't worry, a good boy scout is prepared." he replied.

Lampright turned to Howard.

"Don't worry, he was never a boy scout."

The teams quickly finished searching the ship, Lampright continuing to document all the supplies, as well as the faces of the dead crew to compare with pictures in criminal databases. Within seven more minutes, everything was done.

0023 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

Safe Distance from Lotus Blossom

"Now?" Cooper asked for the eighth time since they had piled into the small craft and sped from the now doomed ship.

Lampright sighed.

"Yes, now." he said.

"Finally. wait 'til you see what I did with a few RPG rockets." Cooper said gleefully hoisting the remote detonator.

"Cooper-" Lampright started, knowing the danger of Cooper saying 'watch this'.

Cooper clicked the button. A dozen balls of flame erupted at the waterline simultaneously. A split second later, a lone explosion blossomed on the deck, followed by a trio of RPG rounds spiraling into the air at approximately 75, 90 and 105 degree angles and exploding above the ship.

"'Little early for 4th of July, isn't it? Larson asked, chomping on a piece of bubble gum.

"Why don't you go drink some fuckin' maple syrup?"

0931 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

Gendo Ikari's Office, NERV Headquarters

"Mister Lampright, you found Eva components aboard the vessel you raided last night." Gendo starred down his glasses at the captain as he made the statement.

"Yes sir, I-"

"You and your team will speak of this to no one. You found nothing in that hold. If you have already said something, what you found were several large pressure vessels intended for use in the chemical industry that to your untrained eye appeared at first to be Eva parts. Is that understood?"

"Yes sir."

"Also, I have been informed that you have pictures of the pressure vessels. Those pictures will be turned over to me and all copies and other saved forms of them destroyed within the next thirty minutes. Is that understood?"

Lampright was beginning to hate this assignment. Every time he thought he was close to an answer, the question just got deeper. He suppressed the anger smoldering inside him.

"Yes sir. What is this about? I deserve to know if-"

"You deserve to know nothing, captain. Now, you will do as you are told. Dismissed."

Lampright snapped to attention and exited the office.

"Douche bag." he muttered as he headed to his office to comply with his demands.


	15. The Fourth Pilot

0601 hrs

0601 hrs. Undisclosed Date

Command Center, NERV Headquarters

Major Katsuragi walked into the command center humming to herself.

"You're early." Ritsuko said, being the only other person present.

"Huh?" she said, distracted.

"My, someone's in a good mood. What's with you?"

"A lady's got to have her secrets, Ritsuko."

"You had sex didn't you?"

"Ritsuko!" she yelled, blushing.

"So who was it? Do I know him?"

"Yyyes."

"Not Kaji."

"Oh GOD no! No no no!"

"Hmmmm... is it-" she was interrupted when CPT Lampright entered with a stack of papers.

"Here's the data you asked for, major."

"Thank you, captain." she said as he walked towards the door.

Ritsuko glanced back and forth between the major and the captain several times, noticing the way they looked at each other, her jaw dropping slightly. She waited until the door closed behind Lampright before speaking again.

"NO. Him?"

Misato blushed.

"I thought you hated him."

"I don't hate him. He's just...complicated."

"Yeah right. Whatever."

"Hey! He's better than your hump, Mr. I-Don't-Care-About-My-Son."

"Hey! Leave Gendo out of it! He's just-

"Complicated?" Misato finished.

Ritsuko sighed.

"You win. So, how was he? I heard those Army guys have a LOT of endurance."

"Well, let's just say he's good at push-ups."

They both giggled like school-girls.

Outside the Door of Command Center, NERV Headquarters

Cooper stood outside the door, his ear pressed against it, Lampright leaning against a wall on the other side of the corridor.

"Dude, I think they're fighting over you." Cooper said with a smirk.

"I want to stab you right now, but then I'd be short a man."

Cooper put his ear to the door again and listened for several seconds.

"Shit they're coming!"

The two began acting as if they hadn't been listening in.

"No shit there I was," Lampright said, began his story with the traditional opening for a verbal tale full of shit.

"pinned in an open field by two ZSU 23-4s-" Lampright continued as the door opened and the major stuck her head out.

"No way! What did-" Cooper started, pretending to be interested.

"Eric, I need to talk to you." she said before pulling her head back in.

"Sly dog. When did YOU get on a first-name basis with the maj?"

"I hate you." Lampright said before entering the room.

"Yes major?"

"We're testing a new Eva and a new pilot in a few days. You're coming with to provide security. It's four days. We're gonna be at the NERV-20, the Matsushiro base with a skeleton crew. I want you to oversee the security of the command center, okay?"

"Alright. When are we leaving?"

"1300, meet me on in the parking garage, we need to pick-up the new pilot.."

"Alright, it's a date. I'll brief my men and pack. See you at 1250."

0819 hrs.Undisclosed Date

N-FOG Offices, NERV Headquarters

"But Lampright, how will I survive without you?" Maloy yelled from the back.

"Look guys, just try not to blow the place up while I'm gone, alright?"

The hairs on the back of Lampright's neck stood up as he said this, although he wasn't sure why.

"I won't make any promises." Cooper said.

"Denisovich, keep his away from the C-4. And the grenades. And anything else I can't think of that explodes. Now, you won't be able to reach me by my motorola, but you can radio NERV-20 and they'll put you through to me if you need anything. Any questions?"

"Can we still torture the security guys?" Howard asked.

"What do I care? I don't know anything about what you're doing, I'm all the way at NERV-20."

"Can I-" Maloy started.

"No." Lampright and Jackson said together.

"Damn."

1251 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Parking Garage, NERV Headquarters

"You're late." Lampright said as the major walked up.

"Shut up." she said playfully.

"Alright, let's get this over with."

"Come on, this'll be like a vacation."

"Yeah, I guess. I just don't like leaving them by themselves. Especially Maloy and Howard. Those two need constant supervision."

"They're big boys, they can take care of themselves for four days."

"I guess you're right, at least I won't have to deal with Asuka. Mind if I drive?"

"Sure, why not."

"Alright, I should warn you, I'm American, so I drive like an asshole." he said as he pulled the bolt out of his M-4 and pocketing it before putting the rifle in the trunk.

1319 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Outside Suzuhara Residence

Lampright stopped the car and the two stepped out, Misato appeared slightly pale.

"You are never allowed to drive again. Ever." she said.

"What'd I do?"

"You mean other than running twelve red lights, cutting-off two semis, playing chicken with a cement truck, and flicking-off a cop?!"

Lampright shrugged.

"He wouldn't let me pass. Besides, I told you I drive like an asshole."

"Just go get him."

"Why do I have to get him? He's YOUR pilot."

"Fine, whatever." she said as she walked to the door.

Misato knocked, and was let in. She returned several minutes later, a very down looking Toji following with a suitcase.

"What's up, Toji?" Lampright said, beginning to get behind the wheel.

"There's no way you're doing that again."

Lampright muttered something about squirrel shits under his breath and moved to the backseat with Toji.

"Why so down, dude? I'd be psyched if they picked me to pilot an Eva."

"I-I dunno. It's jus dat... neva mind." he said, starring aimlessly out the window.

Lampright realized that whatever the problem was, Toji didn't want to talk about it.

"Alright then. So major, whatcha doin' tonight?" Eric asked.

1442 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Parking Area, NERV-20

"Oh, and I'm not allowed to drive?!" Lampright said, getting out of the car.

"Shut-up."

"At least I didn't get us a ticket!"

"Shut-up!"

"Or actually CLIP another vehicle!"

"SHUT-UP!"

"Well, at least we know who's NOT driving back."

"You know I can remove your weapons privileges, right?" she growled.

"See? See how defensive she gets?" Eric whispered to Toji.

Toji just sighed.

"Jez, who shot YOUR dog?"

1534 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

Control Room, NERV-20

Lampright stood in the back of the control room near the door, holding his M-4 at the low ready, as he'd done for the last two days.

'Maybe Misato won't drink herself unconscious like last night and the night before and I can actually get somewhere this time.' he though to himself.

The NERV technicians talked to each other, using their usual technical jargon. LCL, synch rates, circuit numbers, none of it meant anything to him. But it apparently meant something to them. Lampright watched as the Eva began to move on the screen in front of him. It just didn't sit right with him. Such a huge war machine. And the Japanese hated HIS people for inventing the bomb?! In the humble opinion of Eric the dog-face, such a monstrosity had no business existing, let alone being trusted to juveniles. But that was just his opinion.

"I wonder if it's a requirement that all Eva pilots be emotionally fucked, or just some happy coincidence." he quietly asked himself.

Suddenly the atmosphere in the room changed. Voiced were raised, and tinged with panic. Instinctually, Lampright checked the door first, then glanced at the CCTV screens. Clear. Only then did he look at the main screen, and realize what was wrong. The Eva was starring straight at them. Something was wrong, very wrong, Lampright could feel it.

"Oh shi-" Lampright began.

And then everything went black.

1556 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

Lampright awoke, dazed and numb, lying on his back in a pile of rubble. His mouth was filled with dust, and his nostrils were assaulted with the combined scents of burnt wiring, ozone, and the concrete dust that covered everything, including Lampright, in a blanket of soft, gray soot-like particles almost a quarter-inch deep. The amount of dust everywhere was incredible, lowering visibility to about a hundred feet. Lampright heard absolutely nothing as he stood up, which bothered him. His helmet had cracked from front to back and fell from his head as he stood. Lampright clapped his hands. He noise was distant, barely audible at the edge of his hearing.

'Great. My eardrums are punctured. Again.'

Lampright turned up his radio, barely able to hear anything through his earpiece, certainly nothing he could understand.

"Captain Lampright, Commander of U.N. Task Force one-four-niner-six to all receiving stations!" he said over the NERV encrypted frequency.

He wasn't certain, but he was pretty sure he was yelling, with his hearing temporarily been snatched from he was unable to properly modulate his voice.

"NERV-20 has been destroyed! Eva-03 is rogue! Mass casualties! Unknown number, unknown condition! Requesting medevac! LZ is..."

Lampright looked around, unable to see a good spot through the dust. He wracked his brain.

"the parking lot on the edge of the facility!"

Lampright walked as he talked, nearly tripping over something soft. He looked down, squinting through the dust cloud. He had nearly tripped over the sprawled body of a NERV worker. He bent down and checked for the neck.

'Still got a good pulse.'

The man was too covered in dust for Lampright identify the male. Lampright picked him up in a fireman's carry and moved him to the parking lot. Lampright returned to the area, bringing out two more people. His hearing was beginning to return, the silence gradually replaced with a dull ringing. He thought he heard something, although he wasn't sure what, but he thought it was coming from under a concrete slab. He reached under it and lifted a few inches, catching a glimpse of a red jacket and major's insignia. Lampright called upon his last reserves of strength, aided by the adrenaline coursing through his veins. He managed to lift the piece of reinforced concrete, weighing in excess of a quarter ton, and move it out of the way, revealing a pocket underneath it. Inside the pocket lay the unconscious form of Major Misato Katsuragi.

"Major?! Misato?! Can you hear me?! Are you alright?!" he yelled as he felt her neck for a pulse.

'A little below normal, but still good.'

"Come on Major! Let's get back to the party!" he said as he said as he carried her to the parking lot.

As he arrived, the first responders were finally rolling on the scene. The first three injured people were already being treated as Lampright walked out of the dust cloud. A pair of medics ran up and took Misato from him, laying her on a near-by stretcher.

"You are right cap'n?" a third asked.

"I'm fine! There's some more out there! I gotta-"

"Sir, your pupils're dilated." the medic said, shining a penlight in his eyes.

"You've got a concussion. And I think your ears are fucked. You ain't goin' nowhere. Get in the helo."

"I ain't gonna-"

"Sir, you will get on the helo, or I will sedate you and put you on the helo. Clear?"

"Clear! How's, uh, how's the major?!"

"She looks alright. Probably a concussion and some minor scraps and bruises. Maybe a broken bone or two."

Lampright climbed on the helo and sat on the bench seats lining one side, next to the three or four other ambulatory casualties. He pulled off his body armour, feeling the SAPI plate broken into several pieces and the large bruise on his chest. He leaned back in the seat, feeling slightly dizzy, and felt a large wet spot on the back of his left leg. He put his hand to touch it and drew it back, covered in blood. He raised his bloody hand in the air.

"Attendant!" he said, his dizziness growing.

"What do you-" she said seeing his hand.

"My leg is-"

"Get on your back on the stretcher!" she said, cutting open the leg of his pants as he got comfortable.

"Holy shit! Did you know you have a major laceration?"

"No!" Lampright said, still shouting due to his punctured eardrums.

'Hmm. That would explain the dizziness.'

"Doesn't look like it hit anything major-stop moving!"


	16. A Time For Healing

1648 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

NERV Hospital, NERV Headquarters

The NERV ER was flooded with patients from the destruction of NERV-20, all off-duty medical personnel were being recalled to try to cope with the mass of casualties.

"Ringer's!" Smith yelled, holding up a hand.

Someone threw an IV bag of volume expander to him as the newest batch of wounded were rushed in.

"Christ! Are they ever gonna stop coming!" he asked the NERV nurse next to him.

"Yo!" Lampright yelled at him as he was wheeled in.

"The fuck are you doin' here!" Smith asked as he reached over and checked his documentation.

"That's what I said. But they said something about a concussion, and laceration. This doesn't look bad to you, does it?" Lampright asked, showing him his leg.

"Nah, but the blood on your pillow does. Your head is fucked-up. Lay back down." Smith said.

"But I don't wanna-"

"Too bad." Smith said, stabbing a syringe into his leg and injecting him.

"Heeeey thash nooottt farrrr..." Lampright slurred as the anesthetic melted his consciousness.

1856 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

Room 103A, NERV Hospital, NERV Headquarters

Lampright lay unconscious in his hospital bed, his mouth open and drool pooling on his pillow.

"Heh heh. Lampy look's funny when he's sedated." Maloy said, poking him.

"Ahhhh!" Lampright yelled, sitting up.

"Ahhhh!" Maloy yelled, jumping back and falling over.

"Maloy! Who let you in here unsupervised! Somebody get me a mirror!"

"I didn't draw anything yet! I didn't have time, damn it!"

Having heard yelling, the nurse rushed in.

"What's going on in here!"

"Nothing nurse. I was just going." Lampright said, getting up.

"Ha! You wish!" came Smith's voice from behind her.

The nurse turned to Maloy.

"Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to leave if you continue to agitate the patient."

"Yeah Maloy, stop agitating me."

"But it's fun."

"Hey Smith, how's the maj?"

"She's fine. Broken arm and a mild concussion. As a matter of fact, she already left."

"How come SHE gets to leave?"

"Because we don't suspect that SHE cracked her skull." he said, crossing his arms.

Lampright was about to continue, when Smith was called outside. He returned several minutes later.

"How long 'til I can get out of here?" Eric asked.

"Yeah, about that. You were just released."

"What's the catch?"

Smith chewed on his lip for several seconds.

"You've been released into the 'protective custody' of the major until your 72-hour restriction to quarters is over."

"You did what!"

"Three days. And you better not try to show up and work, or I'll make it longer. After that you're on light duty for a week."

"Fine." Lampright said, getting up.

"And use this. You need to keep off your leg so it can heal." Smith said, handing him a crutch.

"I will not gimp through NERV HQ."

"You will, or we will deliver you by gurney."

Lampright took the crutch, muttering and walked to the exit, pausing only long enough to bash Smith in the kneecap with the crutch.

2012 hrs. Undisclosed Date +2

Major Katsuragi's Quarters, NERV Headquarters

Lampright carried a few minor items in a cardboard box under his arm. Asuka lay on the floor in front of the TV, chowing down on a bag of potato chips as Lampright gimped in.

"You know if you keep eating those things you're gonna get fat."

Asuka stuck her tongue out at him. Lampright responded by swiping at her with his crutch, missing purposefully by about a foot.

"Where's your 'mom'?"

"Misato's not back yet. You buy her a gift or something?" Asuka said sarcastically.

"No. I'm movin' in for the next few days." he said, dropping his box and lying down on the couch.

"WHAT! How can-!"

"Don't care." Lampright said, cutting her off and closing his eyes.

2101 hrs.Undisclosed Date +2

"Eric, can you com'ere and help me with the dishes?" Misato asked from the kitchen.

"I don't wanna. I have a headache." Lampright said.

"Hey, that only works when I say it." Misato replied.

"I have a friggin' concussion! I have a headache and I don't want to do it! Lemme alone!"

"Oh, you poor baby." Asuka said, rolling her eyes.

"Hey, you want your own concussion?" Lampright snarled, waving his crutch around threateningly.

"What was that?" Misato asked from the kitchen.

"Asuka volunteered to help you, maj!" Lampright yelled.

"Oh, thank you Asuka!"

Lampright stuck his tongue out at Asuka as she sulked to the kitchen. Less than a minute later, Misato came out.

"That was fast."

"Not really. I just ditched Asuka with the dishes." she said.

"That was responsible."

Misato giggled.

"I read the incident brief. So how's Shinji taking it?"

Misato sighed.

"Not well. He's emotionally fragile enough, without this to deal with. He hasn't come out of his room since medical released him."

"Kids are amazingly resilient. He'll bounce back."

"How can you say that! He thinks he killed one of his only friends!"

"You don't know nearly as much about me as you think." he growled.

"There are a lot of things that aren't included in my service record. Do not make the mistake of thinking that you are the only person who has experienced emotional pain because your parents died."

Lampright stood up.

"I'm gonna talk to 'im. Need back-up first."

"What are you-" she started as Lampright walked out, returning several minutes later with Cooper in tow.

"Hey major, hey bride of Satan." Cooper said, waving to Asuka.

Asuka stuck her tongue out at him, Cooper responded with the bird.

"Stay on task, Boomer." Lampright said, making the hand signal for rally on me, before walking to Shinji's room, knocking on the door.

"Shinji, it's Eric. Open the door man, I wanna talk to you."

No response.

"Come on man, everyone's worried. Open up."

Still no response. Lampright tried the door. Locked.

"Shinji, you got fifteen seconds to open this door, before I take it out." Lampright said.

"Before you what!" the major yelled.

Lampright made a shooing motion with his left hand as he began counting.

"...13...14..." Lampright said, rearing back as well as he could, preparing to kick in the flimsy door, Misato running up to stop him.

The doorknob clicked. Lampright grabbed it and turned, letting himself in. Cooper followed, as did the major. Shinji sat in the corner, curled in the fetal position, his cheeks stained with tears.

"Sorry maj, boys only." Eric said, pushing her back outside and locking the door again.

Cooper leaned against the wall as Eric sat on the futon, crossing his arms behind his head and lying back.

"Alright man, what's on your mind?"

Silence.

"You might as well tell us. We're not gonna leave until you talk."

They sat in silence for several minutes.

"Why? Why did they make me kill him?" Shinji whispered.

"You didn't kill him. The Eva wasn't under your control when it attacked Toji. And he's not dead yet." Lampright said.

"I-I saw him. He won't survive."

"That's not for you to say."

The room was silent again.

"Shinji, I don't know why they crushed the plug, but I'm sure they had a damn good reason."

"I did this to him."

"No, you didn't. Things happen that are outside of our control."

Lampright sighed.

"Shinji, did I ever tell you about how I lost my brothers?"

"You've never mentioned brothers."

"Lampy doesn't like to talk about'em." Cooper said, speaking for the first time since he came in.

"I'm sure you've read in class about the second impact and all the crazy shit that happened afterwards, right? Like when the U.S. was invaded?"

"Yeah. It took years to throw them back."

"Yeah. I was a partisan. So was Boomer-I mean, Cooper here. And so were my brothers. We were assaulting an objective near Selma. I told my brothers to move on the objective. Me and Boomer were providing cover fire. We had the troops suppressed. My brothers left cover, and about a second later a BMP rolled around the corner. It fired on both of them. One of them was killed instantly, literally cut in half by 7.62 rounds. The other was disemboweled, bleeding out, screaming from the unimaginable pain. There was nothing we could have done to save him. So I shot my own brother in the head."

The room was silent again.

"Shinji, you need a drink." Cooper said.

"Cooper. Outside. Now."

The pair left the room.

"Wuzzup?" Cooper said.

"Cooper! We are NOT providing alcohol to a minor!"

"Why not!"

"It's irresponsible for one. Illegal-"

"Besides those."

"No."

"The Maj does it."

"Why do you have to make everything difficult?"

Cooper shrugged.

"It's what I do."

"No, it's what Maloy does. You wanna be like him? Do ya?"

1234 hrs.Undisclosed Date +3

Asuka was now at school, although it had been mutually agreed that Shinji would not be forced to go. Lampright was sprawled out on the couch, wearing nothing but PT shorts and his dog tags, channel surfing while drinking one of Misato's beers. Shinji silently left his room and headed for the kitchen.

"There's nothing in there to eat. The only thing in the 'fridge is beer and Misato's leftovers from last night. And even I couldn't eat those."

Lampright sat up and started putting on a pair of pants.

"Come on. I'll take ya to get some pizza or something. Maybe hit up an arcade."

Shinji started to walk back to his room.

"You don't have a choice. Come on." he said, putting on a black t-shirt with a large yellow Ranger tab on the front.

"Did Misato say it was okay for you to drink her beers?"

"Meh. We'll just say it was Asuka, alright?"

1621 hrs.Undisclosed Date +3

Fun-Time Arcade, Tokyo-3

Shinji and Eric stood in front of one of the light-gun games.

"No no, hold it with both hands, keep a good grip, but don't strangle it. Yeah, like that. Now try."

Lampright popped a few coins into the machine and stepped back.

"Go for it."

"Oops, I shot a civilian." Shinji said.

"Meh, don't worry about it. I do it all the time. In the game I mean."

Eric continued to watch for about another half hour until Shinji completed the game and input his initials, right below Lampright's and Cooper's.

"Sweet. Hey man, we gotta start headin' back to Major's."

1528 hrs.Undisclosed Date +3

Parking Garage, NERV Headquarters

Lampright sighed.

"We're parked Shinji. You can open your eyes now."

Shinji slowly opened one eye then the other.

"How is it you can drive with the Major, but driving with me scares you silly?"

Lampright asked as he and Shinji got out of the car.

"Thanks." Shinji said after they had walked for several minutes in silence.

"No prob. Have fun skipping school?"

Shinji smiled slightly.

"Yeah."

"Good. Misato's cooking again tonight, so it's a good thing we stopped and grabbed some dinner, huh?" Eric said, as he opened the door.

And was ambushed by Misato.

"Laaaampriiiight-!" Misato started.

"What?"

She waved his crutch at him.

"I think ONE of us forgot something this morning!"

"I don't need it."

"Smith said you do, and he's a medic."

"He's also loony. I don't need a friggin' crutch. My legs are fine. See!"

Lampright starts jumping up and down.

"STOP THAT!"

"Why?"

"I'll call Smith."

Lampright started muttering and sat down on the couch.

"Where were you anyway?"

"Me and Shinji were just chillin'."

"Well you got back just in time for dinner. Asuka helped me with it a little."

Lampright acted as though he had just remembered something.

"Oh, were you cooking tonight? I am SO sorry! Me and Shinji JUST ate. I apologize."

Misato glared at him and muttered, walking to the fridge.

"Eric! Did you have some of my beer?"

"No, must've been Asuka."

2223 hrs.Undisclosed Date +3

MAJ Katsuragi's Quarters, NERV Headquarters

The major turned off the lights in the living room on her way to her room.

"You alright, Eric? You need a blanket or anything?"

Lampright lay on the couch, wrapped in a poncho liner.

"Nah, I'm good."

"Why did you do that?" Misato asked.

"Do what?"

"The things you do Shinji. Why?"

"Somebody should. I mean, his dad's a douche bag and all, so..."

Misato smiled a little.

"He really looks up to you."

"Great. When did I become a father figure?"

"I happen to think you'd make a fine father."

"Well, that's one of us."

Misato smiled.

"I see a lot of myself in Shinji. He has potential for great things. Someone just has to show him the path." Eric added.

"Shinji's a good kid. He's just got a few problems."

Eric snorted.

'A few? Shinji's got more issues than National Geographic.'

"Anyway, I gotta get to sleep."

"Yeah, I'm sure you have a BIG day of channel-surfing tomorrow."

"Hey, I do...stuff."

"Like?"

"Well...Maloy's supposed to be bringin' his PS5 by tomorrow morning after PT."

Misato rolled her eyes.


	17. Old Acquaintances

0812 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Cafeteria, NERV Headquarters

"Lampright! Explain yourself!" Misato yelled.

Eric looked up from his bowl of Cocoa Pebbles.

"What did I supposedly do this time?"

"Don't pretend like you don't know!" she yelled.

Lampright looked puzzled before turning to Cooper.

"What'd I do?"

Cooper shrugged.

"You think she knows about-" Cooper started.

"Nah. She couldn't have found out about that already." Eric said.

He turned back to the major.

"I'm gonna stick with 'I don't know what you're talking about'."

"Captain, you requested that yourself and the other four American members of your team be assigned to a special mission!"

"No I didn't, what special mission, and what the HELL are you babbling about!"

"This!" she yelled, brandishing several sheets of paper in front of his face.

"That'd be easier to read if you'd stop moving it around." Cooper commented.

"SHUT-UP!" she snarled.

"Damn major, someone's hormonal today." Lampright said, snatching the paper from her hand.

"Cooper, Jackson, Carey and Maloy! Y'all are with me on an extraction mission to pull some civilian doc outta Thailand before her field hospital gets overrun by the rebel faction."

"What's the matter maj? Jealous?" Maloy asked.

"Shut-up Maloy!" Both Lampright and the major said in unison.

Maloy looked at them, slightly puzzled at the response.

"Holy shit Cooper! Look who it is!"

Cooper craned his neck.

"Who?"

"Bethany Roberts."

"Well cover me in shit'n call me a rainbow." Cooper said.

Everyone stopped and starred at him.

"What?"

0912 hrs.Undisclosed Date

N-FOG Offices, NERV Headquarters

"And Denisovich is in charge while I'm gone. HOWARD BEHAVE!" Lampright finished.

"Da. I will keep an eye on our man for you sir." Denisovich responded.

"I know ya will. Now let's go boys, we got a bird to catch." he said to Cooper, Jackson, Maloy and Carey.

The five stepped out and started the walk to the helipad.

"Remember, ROE says we can only return fire." Lampright said.

"So why are WE going sir?" Jackson asked.

"It's a very time-sensitive issue, and what with the situation in the Spratly Islands heating up and sucking up most of the spec-ops in the area, we're the closest U.S. forces."

"So what's the plan, sir?" Carey asked.

"Well, we're gonna catch a bird to Camp Zappa, from there we get catch another bird to the fleet, the fleet'll put us on an RIB to the coast of Thailand, we hoof it inland a few klicks to the objective, grab her, and pull her out by helo."

"Why not just put in by helo?" Jackson asked.

"Well, first off, we don't have that kind of linger time. It has the possibility of gettin' pretty hot down there, and they don't want a bird in the air any longer than possible. They're also not exactly sure the facility is."

"Awesome." Cooper replied, opening the hatch to the helipad.

"Indeed!" he said, yelling to be heard over the sound of the rotors.

'It's gonna be a long day.' he thought.

1630 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Deck of the USS Ronald Reagan CVN-76, 100 miles off the coast of Thailand

The five members of the team stepped out of the helo, stooping low to avoid the rotors as they ran towards the seaman waving at them. The man straightened and saluted as Lampright approached.

"Cut that shit out, sailor."

"Sir, I'm Lieutenant Junior Grade Stevens, commander of this ship's detachment of Special Boat Unit 4! We're assigned to bring your boys in sir! We leave at 0130 tomorrow morning!"

"Outstanding son! Y'all just get us there in one piece, ya hear!"

The LJG responded with a thumbs-up.

"Good man!" Lampright said, slapping him on the shoulder as he walked past.

"Now where are our berths!"

1703 hrs.Undisclosed Date

Crew Berths of the USS Ronald Reagan CVN-76, Underway

"So Lampy, ya ready to start up where ya left off?" Cooper asked with a grin.

"Hey Cooper, meet me in my berth." Lampright said opening his door.

"Aww, man." Cooper replied, walking into Lampright's room.

"I swear, it's not my fault!" Cooper said, sitting down in a chair.

"Hey Cooper, if I tell ya something, you have to promise not to tell any of the others."

"Is this about you snogging the major?"

"HOW DO YOU KNOW ABOUT THAT!"

"Well, I knew you were gettin' some from someone, and I had my suspicions, so once I knew to look for it, it was pretty easy to spot; I saw how both of you acted every time you were both in the same room. And that you just called me in here to discuss it in private confirms it."

"So does anyone else know?"

"Nah, the only reason I caught on was 'cause I've known you forever and a day. I figured you wouldn't want it out, so I kept it to myself."

"Good man Cooper."

0342 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

About one mile off the coast of Thailand

LJG Stevens took another glance at his GPS and cut the small craft's engines.

"We're close to the coast. Time to paddle boys."

Jackson and Cooper both picked up the paddles stashed inside the boat and began quietly paddling towards land, stopping about twenty meters from shore. Stevens motioned for them to get out, and they dropped into the four foot deep water.

"This is kinda cold. I got shrinkage." Maloy said.

"Remind me why we brought you?" Lampright replied as he flipped down his NODs.

Cooper took point, leading with his shotgun. The group moved silently through the jungle single file for several hours. Suddenly the hand signal came up the line to stop. The men slowly crouched down, Maloy at the back pulling rear security, Jackson and Carey turning outwards to watch the flanks as Lampright watched the front as Cooper came up to brief him.

"We got a river up ahead, and two bad guys with AKs, one on each side of the river." he whispered.

Lampright motioned for everyone to gather on him.

"Carey, keep the far guy covered with that silenced M-4, when Cooper takes the near guy, light'im up. Maloy, once both are down, you cross the water and secure the far side." Lampright told them.

Carey nodded and Cooper and Maloy flashed a thumbs-up.

"What about the rules of engagement?" Jackson asked.

"We're already engaged, didn't you hear it? One of'em clearly shot at me."

Lampright watched through his NODs as Cooper drew his knife and crept up to the soldier. He reached out with his left hand, clamping it over his mouth and jerking the man's head up, drawing his knife across his neck with his right hand. He buckled his knees, allowing the dead man's weight to carry him backwards, falling into the brush and thick vines which hit him and the body. As he fell, he drew his knife back, and thrust it into the man's kidney, just to be sure. Carey, already kneeling and aiming, gently squeezed his trigger. The rifle bucked slightly and released a tiny pop as the other soldier dropped to the ground, dead. Maloy charged off across the water, moving through it with barely a ripple in the way only his kind could. Jackson and Lampright brought up the rear, and rendezvoused with Cooper and Carey before crossing the river. Maloy, who had been about a hundred meters down the road, came running back to them, hunched over.

"Sir, I got stationary lights far in the distance, my guess 'bout half a klick dead thatta way." he said, pointing.

Lampright nodded, and motioned for them to form up in a file again and follow Maloy. They covered the distance quickly, stopping in the woodline about fifty meters from the group of about a dozen or so huts, the thrumming of a generator audible in the background, although only two of the huts seemed to have lighting. He motioned for Maloy, Jackson and Carey to take a perimeter, while he and Cooper checked the huts. The pair checked the one to their left first, Cooper throwing open the door and Lampright entering first. The pair had burst in, weapons up, on a surgical suite, and an operation was currently in progress.

'Good, we're in the right place.' Eric thought to himself.

Their arrival send the room into an uproar, the two of the three Thai women and one Thai man were freaking out at the arrival of two heavily armed men in their operating theater. The third woman, apparently the one in charge, started to walk up to them.

"We are not here to hurt you, we are American." Lampright said in Thai, supplementing his words by repeatedly pointing a finger at the US flag patch on his shoulder.

The woman walked up to him and slapped him across the face, yelling in Thai.

"How dare you burst into my operating room like this, guns pointing everywhere, scaring my assistants! We're in the middle of a surgery!"

"Noted." he replied, turning around and walking from the hut, motioning for Cooper to follow. The other lighted hut was larger, and had two doors on opposite sides of the hut from each other. He motioned for Cooper to take one door, and he'd take the other. Cooper nodded, and crept towards his door. The SEAL flung open the door and rushed in, shotgun up. Right in front of him was a red-haired woman pointing a makerov pistol directly at him.

"Come on lady, put the pistol down." he said in English.

"I don't know you are, but you're not gonna do whatever you're here to do!"

"Damnit! Why do you always have to make things difficult! Just put the gun away and everything's cool."

"Really? Looks to me like we're got a stand-off." she replied.

"Not really. Look behind you."

"I'm not falling for that."

"Hi Beth." Lampright said from behind her, right before grabbing her around the stomach and knocking the pistol from her hand.

"You guys really know how to roll out the red carpet for old friends 'round here." Cooper said.

"What?" she said, as Lampright walked around in front of her and pulled down his baclava.

"Yo." he said simply.

Beth stared at them both for several seconds.

"Eric? Daniel?"

"Yep. The dynamic duo back again." Cooper answered with a grin.

"Carey, Maloy, Jackson, get inside the hut on the right." Lampright radioed.

"We're here to extract you." Eric explained as the other three soldiers walked in.

Beth slapped Eric in the face.

"I guess I deserved that." he said.

"You have a lot of nerve, just showing up like this!" she yelled, attracting the attention of the other soldiers.

"Hi Beth, it's nice to see you too." Eric said sarcastically.

"Three years, and I don't hear anything, and now you show up with a posse on my front step!"

"We were in the neighborhood. Besides, as I remember it, YOU were the one who dumped ME. And I wrote you SEVERAL letters while I was in OCS. I stopped when you didn't write back."

"Those don't count! I was still angry with you!"

"This is why I never tracked you down. Because I knew you'd still be the same, stubborn, illogical, bitter old-"

Gunner was cut off as she slapped him again.

"Why does everyone keep doing that!" he yelled.

She curled her lip.

"Besides, as I said before, YOU left ME." he reiterated

"You know why I had to do that, because-"

"Because I took that commission. And you know why I had to take the commission." he said, turning back to Cooper.

"And I see you're still following him around." she said to Cooper as she reached down and pocketed her pistol.

"And I see you're still bitter." he replied.

"Somebody wanna let me in on the back-story here?" Jackson said.

"Lampright and Beth used to uh...used to be a pair a while back. It's...it's complicated." Cooper responded.

"Usually is when women get involved." Maloy muttered.

"Sat-intel shows a large force of hostiles movin' directly towards ya. You need to pack up your op and move the fuck out. We got room for us, you, and eight other people in the helo."

"Well I have over eighty people here, and I'm not leaving them. You can't make me."

"Beth-"

"I'm not leaving with you!" she growled, pulling the out, but refraining from pointing it at anyone.

Jackson looked to Lampright, who nodded once.

Jackson leveled his weapon at her and fired the grenade launcher. The bean-bag flew true, and struck her in the chest, knocking her to the ground unconscious.

0944 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

Aboard MH-60 Enroute to USS Ronald Regan CVN-76

Beth regained slowly regained consciousness, looking around the inside of the helo groggily. She squinted at Lampright for a second, focusing on him.

"I can't believe you shot me!" she yelled at him suddenly.

"Oh please. You've known me for how long and you're surprised? Cooper, tell her."

"Yeah, you shoulda seen this comin'." he confirmed.

"And you just left my people there." she said bitterly.

"Ah, come on. Gimme some credit. Parts of 1st SFG are gonna be in later today in MH-53s to grab'em."

"Assuming they're still alive." he muttered.

"Yeah. My mission wasn't them. My mission was you. What did you think I would do? Abandon my mission and lead all of you on a nice little hike to the border? This ain't a movie." he said, leaning the closed door of the aircraft, starring out the window opposite him.

"So you swoop in to save me just in the nick of time, just like the old days huh?" she said, starring straight at the ceiling.

"Yeah, just like the old days." he said dryly.

"'Cept Danny ain't blown anything up today."

"The day's not over!" Cooper yelled.

"Indeed. Hey Beth, you know you already missed a mid-air refueling. Twice." Lampright said.

"Where exactly are we going?" she asked.

"Japan. We're already over Kyushu. We should be there in less than an hour." Cooper stated.

"Well, you probably won't be shipped back home for a few days. You wanna get together, just you, me & Cooper after we get off for the day? It'll be just like old times." Eric said.

"Yeah. Sure, why not." she said, smirking slightly.

2311 hrs.Undisclosed Date +1

Residential Area, NERV headquarters

Eric and Beth are walking down the hall, stopping outside Eric's quarters.

"Too bad Cooper couldn't show up." Beth said.

"Alright, well, it's been 'nice' seein' ya, but I gotta turn in for the night."

"That's it? just gonna go to sleep?" she said, raising an eyebrow and smiling at him.

"Yeah, I'd invite you in to my room, but while I was gone, Howard hacked my keycard and glued all my furniture to the ceiling."

"Wow sounds like you work with some GREAT guys."

"Yeah, he's a hoot." he said, rolling his eyes.

"Well, I'll see you around." she said, giving him a good hug and walking away down the hall.

Lampright leaned against the wall, watching her walk away for almost a minute before turning around. Major Katsuragi stood behind him, fuming.

"What? It was a hug. It was completely innocent and-"

Eric stopped for a minute.

"-you don't care what I have to say, do you?"

She glared at him.

"I suppose this is the wrong time to ask if I can crash on your couch, huh?"

She gave him the death stare for several more seconds before returning to her room, slamming the door behind her.

Eric sighed loudly, and banged on a door.

"Hey Cooper, open up! I need your couch!"


End file.
